Cops & Courts – Press Heraldhttps://www.pressherald.com
Thu, 22 Feb 2018 05:13:57 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.4Portland councilors generally support policy for police use of body camerashttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/portland-councilors-generally-support-policy-for-police-use-of-body-cameras/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/portland-councilors-generally-support-policy-for-police-use-of-body-cameras/#respondThu, 22 Feb 2018 00:13:01 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/portland-councilors-generally-support-policy-for-police-use-of-body-cameras/City councilors on Wednesday expressed support for proposed rules governing police use of body cameras in Maine’s largest city, but some advocates want more information about how the technology would be used at schools, hospitals and public assemblies.

Councilors received an overview of the Portland Police Department’s eight-page policy laying out when officers must record their encounters, when they can stop recording and activities they are prohibited from recording.

“I just want to extend my appreciation for the work that has been done,” Councilor Nicholas Mavodones said. “It’s far more complicated than I thought it would have been.”

Body cameras are designed to increase transparency in policing, but concerns have been raised over privacy.

Police Chief Michael Sauschuck said he is receiving feedback from outside groups, including advocates for domestic violence prevention, school officials and free speech advocates.

Sauschuck predicted the policy would evolve, especially after a pilot program with eight cameras is rolled out by April 1 and prior to full implementation in the fall, which calls for 100 additional cameras.

No public comment was taken at the meeting. But representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine and the Maine NAACP attended the workshop.

Afterward, both groups were pleased with the policy direction and Sauschuck’s willingness to discuss their concerns about policies governing use in schools, hospitals and legal public assemblies.

Rachel Talbot Ross, a state representative who was speaking on behalf of the NAACP of Maine, said she would like more details about use in those arenas.

“There is still some work to do in refining those areas,” Talbot Ross said.

Oamshri Amarasingham, advocacy director for the ACLU of Maine, said she wanted to ensure that constitutional assemblies did not become opportunities for police to gather information that could later be mined using facial recognition and other technologies.

“I’m looking more closely at that,” Amarasingham said.

The policy would require officers to record all enforcement actions, but allow them to turn off the device in limited cases, such as protecting the privacy of victims and confidential informants.

The policy also would prohibit officers from using the cameras to “gather intelligence” during legal assemblies and political protests. But Sauschuck said the cameras would be on if officers were conducting crowd control or responding to a call.

The policy is a key remaining step toward Portland’s long-planned use of body cameras by the police force.

City officials secured $26,000 in grant funds from the Department of Justice last April to purchase eight cameras for the pilot program. That initial funding was expected to be followed by a $400,000 investment in the technology in the next budget.

Body cameras have been debated nationally since several high-profile instances in which police officers shot and killed people of color. The debate became a hot button issue in Portland last year, after police shot and killed 22-year-old Chance David Baker at a St. John Street shopping center.

However, City Manager Jon Jennings said he and Sauschuck had been discussing body cameras for the past year and half, and that the rollout had nothing to do with any “external event.”

Portland’s policy would require the department to retain recordings for 210 days, unless a recording is flagged for extended retention for a potential civil claim, lawsuit or personnel complaint.

The public can gain access to those recordings under Maine’s Freedom of Access Act and “other applicable laws.”

Randy Billings can be reached at 791-6346 or at:

rbillings@pressherald.com

Twitter: randybillings

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/portland-councilors-generally-support-policy-for-police-use-of-body-cameras/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1336020_652545-BodyCamera.jpgThe Portland Police Department's eight-page policy on body cameras states that officers must record all enforcement actions, but turn off cameras in limited circumstances. Staff file photo by Andy MolloyWed, 21 Feb 2018 21:51:20 +0000SWAT team raids South Portland motel; 4 arrested on theft and drug chargeshttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/drug-raid-at-south-portland-motel-nets-4-arrests/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/drug-raid-at-south-portland-motel-nets-4-arrests/#respondWed, 21 Feb 2018 15:33:21 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/21/drug-raid-at-south-portland-motel-nets-4-arrests/Four people were arrested on theft and drug trafficking charges Tuesday after a SWAT team executed a search warrant at the Maine Motel in South Portland, police said.

Officers converged on the motel, located at 606 Main St., about 5:30 p.m. in connection with an ongoing investigation by the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, South Portland Detective Sgt. Chris Todd said in a statement.

Officers set off two flash bangs, an explosive device that creates a loud bright diversion. Three people were arrested at the motel, and a fourth was apprehended as he tried to flee in a vehicle. No shots were fired and no one was injured, police said.

The Maine Motel at 606 Main St. in South Portland. Google photo

Arrested were:

• Aaron West, 36, of Westbrook, who is charged with robbery, violating conditions of release and a theft-related arrest warrant.

• Freddie Mejias, 51, of Standish, charged with aggravated trafficking in heroin, aggravated trafficking in cocaine, and possession of heroin. Meijas was found in possession of 33 grams of heroin and 24 grams of cocaine, police said.

• Jorge Torres, 30, of South Portland, charged with aggravated trafficking in heroin, a probation violation from a previous drug trafficking charge. He was found with 12 grams of heroin and 5.6 grams of cocaine in the hotel room, police said.

Lt. Frank Clark said the agencies teamed up to serve what Clark described as “high risk search warrants” at the Maine Motel, at 606 Main St. An official described it as a drug-related search warrant.

Clark said residents may have heard officers using flash bang grenades, which produce a bright light and thunderous blast to distract potentially dangerous criminals.

“What I can say at this point is that South Portland Police Department and Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, assisted by our Southern Maine Regional SWAT team, served high risk search warrants at the Maine Motel earlier this evening,” Clark said in an email. ” There were no injuries and an increased police presence may remain in that area as the investigation is ongoing.”

Clark said additional information concerning the raid might not be available until late Tuesday or Wednesday morning.

Scott Pelletier, a spokesman for the MDEA, said his agency became involved after being made aware that drugs could be present in the motel room.

“I can confirm that we are doing a drug related search warrant at the Maine Motel, but there is another angle to this case that South Portland is working as well,” Pelletier said.

Pelletier was not certain if any arrests had been made.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/police-drug-enforcement-officers-raid-south-portland-motel/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/08/shutterstock_655712101-e1501172751470.jpgTue, 20 Feb 2018 20:28:56 +0000Driver, 2 passengers face charges after being pulled over in Arundelhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/driver-2-passengers-face-charges-after-being-pulled-over-in-arundel/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/driver-2-passengers-face-charges-after-being-pulled-over-in-arundel/#respondWed, 21 Feb 2018 00:50:08 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/driver-2-passengers-face-charges-after-being-pulled-over-in-arundel/A Biddeford man is facing multiple charges after being pulled over Tuesday morning in Arundel, according to York County Sheriff William L. King Jr.

Tison Gagne, 28, gave the wrong name and told the officer, contract deputy Greg Sevigny, that he did not have any identification after getting pulled over around 9:30 a.m., King said. But Sevigny’s investigation revealed that Gagne was an habitual offender and that his driver’s license had been revoked by the state.

King said in a statement that Gagne was arrested and charged with operating after being declared an habitual offender, failure to provide his correct name and date of birth, and operating with a suspended registration.

Gagne was being held Tuesday night at the York County Jail in Alfred on $500 cash bail. He will make his initial court appearance via video Wednesday morning.

King said two passengers in Gagne’s motor vehicle were arrested on outstanding warrants.

Rebecca Person, 25, of Biddeford had an outstanding warrant for failure to appear on a theft charge. Jail workers also found drug paraphernalia on her, a discovery that led to Person being charged with trafficking in prison contraband, King said.

Erick Robinson, 33, of Biddeford was arrested on a warrant charging him with failure to appear in court for unlawful possession of scheduled drugs.

King said the contract deputy pulled the vehicle over because he determined that the motor vehicle Gagne was driving had a suspended registration – due to Maine Turnpike Authority toll violations.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/driver-2-passengers-face-charges-after-being-pulled-over-in-arundel/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/12/cop-clip-41.jpgpolice for featured imageTue, 20 Feb 2018 20:07:38 +0000Lincoln Academy student charged with threateninghttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/lincoln-academy-student-charged-with-threatening/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/lincoln-academy-student-charged-with-threatening/#respondTue, 20 Feb 2018 23:37:47 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/lincoln-academy-student-charged-with-threatening/A student at Lincoln Academy in Newcastle has been charged with threatening other students and placed in the custody of his parents.

Lt. Michael Murphy of the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office said the boy was taken into police custody Friday evening after investigators met with the boy and his mother. The student is charged with terrorizing, a Class D misdemeanor, and is not being identified because he is a juvenile.

“After all interviews were completed, it is the belief of investigators that the student was unlikely to act on his alleged threat,” Murphy said in a statement.

Faculty at the private high school, which serves 18 towns in Lincoln County and has students from 16 other countries, learned Friday that the student, “made threatening comments to other students during school on Thursday, Feb. 15.”

The alleged threatening comments were made just one day after Nikolas Cruz shot and killed 17 students and teachers at Marjory Stoneham Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida in one of the nation’s deadliest school massacres.

Murphy said investigators conducted several interviews before deciding to issue a juvenile summons charging the student with terrorizing.

“While there appears to be no further cause for concern in this matter, it is the policy of the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office to investigate all complaints of this nature and pursue all suspects without delay,” Murphy said.

Murphy did not respond to an email seeking the student’s age and grade.

Dennis Hoey can be contacted at 791-6365 or at:

dhoey@pressherald.com

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/lincoln-academy-student-charged-with-threatening/feed/0Tue, 20 Feb 2018 20:21:05 +0000Woman allegedly attacks police after they use stun gun to subdue her boyfriendhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/bar-fight-leads-to-charges-against-man-woman-from-skowhegan/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/bar-fight-leads-to-charges-against-man-woman-from-skowhegan/#respondTue, 20 Feb 2018 21:21:22 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/?p=1335822SKOWHEGAN — A Skowhegan man and a woman believed to be his girlfriend were arrested early Sunday outside a local tavern after allegedly fighting with three police officers.

Police used a stun gun to subdue Paul LeClair, 26, and as they handcuffed him, Kasey Knowles, 31, also of Skowhegan, allegedly attacked one of the officers from behind, punching him and pulling on his equipment and uniform, according to Skowhegan Police Chief David Bucknam.

Kasey Knowles and Paul LeClair

The incident occurred just before 1 a.m. Sunday at Bloomfield’s Tavern, when Sgt. Herbert Oliver, Officer Jacob Boudreau and Officer Ryan Blakeney responded to a report of a fight inside the bar and found LeClair and Knowles yelling outside the bar.

Witnesses told police that LeClair and another man had gotten into a fight in the bar and LeClair had to be removed from the premises by Bloomfield’s staff, who told police they didn’t want LeClair to come back in.

Despite several warnings, LeClair “continued to remain defiant and continued to yell at everyone,” Bucknam said, and when Boudreau, Blakeney and Oliver tried to put LeClair under arrest and handcuff him, LeClair continued to resist. That’s when Oliver used his stun gun.

As LeClair was being taken into custody, Knowles allegedly attacked Blakeney from behind, punching him and pulling on his equipment and uniform.

Knowles was arrested and charged with obstructing government administration, assault on a law enforcement officer and disorderly conduct.

LeClair was taken into custody and charged with failure to submit to arrest or detention, assault on a law enforcement officer, criminal mischief and disorderly conduct. Assault on a law enforcement officer is a Class C felony, punishable by up to five years in prison. The other charges are misdemeanors.

Bucknam said Boudreau’s watch was broken, Oliver’s wrist was injured and his body camera was destroyed in the scuffle.

LeClair and Knowles were taken to the Somerset County Jail. LeClair was released on $1,000 bail. Knowles was released on $300 bail.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/bar-fight-leads-to-charges-against-man-woman-from-skowhegan/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/knowles-leclair.jpgWed, 21 Feb 2018 17:58:37 +0000Ruling expected this week in 1980 Maine cold case murder trialhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/ruling-expected-this-week-in-maine-murder-trial-stemming-from-1980-cold-case/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/ruling-expected-this-week-in-maine-murder-trial-stemming-from-1980-cold-case/#respondTue, 20 Feb 2018 19:34:31 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/ruling-expected-this-week-in-maine-murder-trial-stemming-from-1980-cold-case/BANGOR – A judge will announce her decision later this week in the case of a murder charge stemming from a decades-old death in Maine.

Fifty-seven-year-old Philip Scott Fournier is charged with killing 16-year-old Joyce McLain in East Millinocket in 1980. Superior Court Justice Ann Murray is expected to make her decision public on Thursday.

The case baffled investigators for years. There isn’t physical evidence tying Fournier to the crime scene, but prosecutors say he confessed numerous times over the years. Fournier’s defense says the defendant’s memories are unreliable.

Final arguments in the case were held earlier this month. A defense lawyer said “doubts will linger” over the case regardless of whether Fournier is convicted.

McLain disappeared while jogging and her body was found two day later wearing only sneakers and socks.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/20/ruling-expected-this-week-in-maine-murder-trial-stemming-from-1980-cold-case/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1335160_239054_fournier6kb.jpgA Superior Court justice is expected to announce her verdict Thursday in the murder trial of Philip Scott Fournier, who is charged in the 1980 death of high school student Joyce McClain in East Millinocket.Tue, 20 Feb 2018 14:36:47 +0000Woman who stole from her family arrested on drug-related chargeshttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/19/woman-jailed-for-2016-theft-from-safe-arrested-wednesday-on-drug-charges/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/19/woman-jailed-for-2016-theft-from-safe-arrested-wednesday-on-drug-charges/#respondMon, 19 Feb 2018 22:18:19 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/?p=1334748SKOWHEGAN — A Skowhegan woman convicted last year of stealing $22,000 from a family member is back in jail after she allegedly was found with more than 50 hypodermic needles and the results of a urine test showed she had methamphetamine and cocaine in her system.

Jaclyn Rutherford

On the suspicion that 29-year-old Jaclyn Rutherfordhad stolen more money from a family member, Skowhegan police Officer Tifani Warren accompanied a probation officer on a visit to Rutherford’s home Wednesday morning, according to Chief David Bucknam

After finding needles and other drug paraphernalia in the home, they ordered Rutherford to provide a urine sample. But while Rutherford was in the bathroom she tried to falsify the sample by “urinating in the toilet then filling the test kit with toilet water,” Bucknam said.

Rutherford has no income and has not been able to work since February 2016, when she suffered severe head trauma in a traffic accident in Oakland, according to police and court documents.

In November 2016, Rutherford stole $22,000 by prying open a family safe.

In January 2017 she was sentenced to serve six months in jail for the theft, followed by three years of probation. She also was ordered to pay restitution for the amount of stolen money she’d spent, $5,200.

Rutherford is being held without bail at the Somerset County Jail pending her court appearance this week on charges of falsifying physical evidence and illegal possession of hypodermic needles. It is unclear if she has a lawyer.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/19/woman-jailed-for-2016-theft-from-safe-arrested-wednesday-on-drug-charges/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/Rutherford2.jpgTue, 20 Feb 2018 11:48:06 +0000Loved ones believe mental illness led Chance Baker to bad decisions – and into the sights of a gunhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/18/loved-ones-believe-undiagnosed-mental-illness-led-chance-baker-to-a-series-of-bad-decisions-and-the-sights-of-a-gun/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/18/loved-ones-believe-undiagnosed-mental-illness-led-chance-baker-to-a-series-of-bad-decisions-and-the-sights-of-a-gun/#respondSun, 18 Feb 2018 09:00:00 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/?p=1334155Chance David Baker lay dying on a sidewalk in front of the Subway sandwich shop at Union Station Plaza.

He was wearing an oversized hunting jacket camouflaged to look like an autumn forest. It had been his beloved grandfather’s. Next to him on the ground was a pellet rifle he’d bought 15 minutes earlier at nearby Coastal Trading & Pawn, as well as an unfinished 40-ounce bottle of Colt 45 malt liquor, wrapped in a red bandanna.

It was 11:19 a.m. and he was falling-down drunk, with a blood alcohol level of at least 0.241.

Inside Baker’s pocket was a paycheck from a temporary agency in Portland, dated Feb. 18, 2017, that very morning. He’d worked the day before, loading and unloading trucks, and made a little more than $100.

Until eight months before his death, Baker had worked three minimum wage jobs simultaneously. He was 22 years old and thrived on paychecks; they’d pulled him out of homelessness before and maybe they would again.

Lodged inside his brain was a single bullet, shot by Portland police Sgt. Nicholas Goodman because Baker, acting erratically and waving the gun around, had – over the course of the prior 10 minutes – been deemed a threat. Goodman, who declined to comment for this story, told investigators he was afraid for his own safety and for that of others in the shopping center.

No ruling has been issued yet by the Maine Office of the Attorney General as to whether Baker’s death was a justifiable homicide (the office has never declared any police shooting unjustified). But an investigative report released to the Maine Sunday Telegram last week in response to a Freedom of Access Act request sheds light not just on that day but Baker’s other interactions with police in his last year, revealing paranoia, hallucinations and erratic behavior in keeping with what his family and friends believe was an undiagnosed mental health illness.

The investigative report is full of dates, times, police business; it’s about public safety. Thus there’s nothing in there about that paycheck, or the many others Baker accumulated in Maine since his arrival from Iowa in 2012. For those who loved or liked him, the story of Chance David Baker cannot be complete unless you talk about the way he smiled, the way he strived, the friendships he made and sadly, the mental deterioration in his last year that most of them only guessed at and which deposited him squarely in Goodman’s sights on a cold February day in 2017.

FROM IOWA FIELDS, WITH DREAMS

“An old country boy,” his mother, Shantel Baker, calls Chance now, talking on the phone from the apartment in Glenwood, Iowa, where she lives with her mother, Terry Baker, and their collective grief and unrelenting confusion about what happened to the young man they loved.

Chance David Baker is pictured in cap and gown during his 2013 graduation from the Portland Adult Education program. An avid hunter and fisherman, the Iowa native came to Portland a year earlier, reporting back to family members about being able to fish off the piers on the waterfront. Photo courtesy of Molly Haley

She had named him Chance because it was a wonder he was born at all. She had miscarried before, and during her pregnancy with Chance, she had lost his twin. Chance had epilepsy when he was small but by the time he was 7 had outgrown it, his mother said.

In this small town of about 5,000 near the Nebraska border, she and Terry taught him to be polite, but the way he cared about others surprised even those already inclined to adore him. That time he went door to door, gathering cast-off coats for less fortunate children who lived nearby. The way he always said that even if you had nothing to give, you could always give a smile.

He’d left them in 2012, bound for Portland. The Baker family had friends who were from Portland and lived in Iowa for a time; they’d brought Chance to Maine in the summer, and he’d loved it. After that family moved back to Maine, Chance began talking of moving to Portland himself.

His mother extracted a promise that he’d finish high school once he got to Maine. School had never been his thing; he’d rather have been fishing and hunting. He took down his first deer at age 7, with his grandfather, the one whose jacket Chance was wearing when he died. Chance loved fishing so much, he’d do it in a ditch, his mother said. “It was just rainwater, but to him it was like he was going to catch a shark,” Shantel Baker said.

From Portland, he called home to tell them about fishing off the piers. He also told them he’d been asked to leave the home of his childhood best friend. In the spring of 2013 he’d been arrested twice, first for breaking into a house in April, then for trespassing in May, and was no longer welcome. He told them not to worry; he’d found Preble Street and was getting help there.

Donna Bilodeau, a former caseworker at the Preble Street Teen Center, had a routine on Wednesday mornings, when she would ask the young people she was working with to join her for a walk around Back Cove. “Chance was the only one that ever took me up on the offer,” Bilodeau remembers. They’d circle the cove, with Chance telling her of his childhood in Iowa, of riding four-wheelers and fishing. He was excited to get his GED, to take computer classes, and to use the resources at Preble Street.

“He was there for anything and everything that would better his life,” Bilodeau said.

In Iowa, Shantel Baker tried not to worry. Chance said he’d be fine, but then he always said that. He called her every couple of days. She’d send Subway coupons to him whenever she could, care of Preble Street.

NO TIME TO SLEEP

The caseworkers at Preble Street rejoiced when the friendly kid from Iowa began landing jobs, at the Nickelodeon Cinemas and at the Hampton Inn on Fore Street. At the hotel, he worked an overnight shift, helping with the night audit (balancing the books), occasionally valet parking and greeting guests. They gave him a navy blue blazer, a uniform that was optional, but he latched onto.

“He took so much pride in wearing it,” said Tasha Sheff-Horton, who supervised Baker at the Hampton Inn and quickly developed a sisterly affection for him. She’d text as she came on in the morning: Did Baker need a breakfast sandwich from McDonald’s? Chicken McNuggets?

“He acted like I was bringing him steak from Fore Street,” Sheff-Horton said.

Most nights Baker worked with Paula Dyar. The guests appreciated how unfailingly polite he was, Dyar said. “You could watch how his body language changed when a guest walked up. He’d straighten right up.” She felt protected by him if there were drunken guests or angry customers. In the downtime, they talked.

“He had so many dreams that I honestly couldn’t keep track of them,” Dyar said.

Sitting at the Union Station Plaza site where their friend and former Hampton Inn co-worker Chance Baker was shot by police last year, Tasha Sheff-Horton, left, and Paula Dyar share memories of him last week. “He had so many dreams that I honestly couldn’t keep track of them,” says Dyar. Staff photo by Ben McCanna

There was music – he’d be a rapper, he told her – and there was the apprenticeship he was doing at ‘Til Death Tattoo, learning how to do body piercings. But maybe he’d build a shelter for pit bulls, the dogs he’d grown up with, which he loved the best.

Baker had little time for the kinds of dreams that happen with your eyes closed, because he barely slept. He’d arrive at the Hampton Inn around 11:30 p.m., immediately following a shift at the Nickelodeon that began at 5:30 p.m. He sold tickets and concessions and cleaned at the Nickelodeon. Sometimes he’d see someone from his Preble Street days, like Peggy Akers, who had helped him at the Teen Center.

Three days a week, he’d go from the Nickelodeon to the Hampton Inn and then go back to his apartment building on Marginal Way, where he did maintenance and cleaning work. Mike Day, who was mentoring him to be a piercer at ‘Til Death Tattoo, describes Baker as layering on clothes so he could peel off an outside layer when he got to job 1, then take another layer off for job 2. Baker was like Clark Kent, peeling off his suit to reveal a Superman outfit, except he was doing it for jobs where he was making slightly more than minimum wage.

Chance Baker grew up in Iowa, and moved to Maine in 2012. Courtesy photo

“He was probably the hardest-working person I have ever met,” said Zach Cunningham, who worked with him at the Nickelodeon, and then, with Baker’s help, got a job at the Hampton Inn.

“He saved every penny he earned,” Dyar said. “He was shockingly responsible with his money.”

But he was generous at the same time, showing up with a stuffed animal for Dyar, and for Cunningham a concoction that involved mashing Fritos onto a frozen pizza and melting it with extra cheese. “Just like an abomination, you know?” Cunningham said, laughing. He thanked Baker, but said he told him: “This is really good, but you should maybe eat it once a year.”

His co-workers worried about how little sleep Baker got. Cunningham remembers walking into the tiny room behind the concession counter at the Nickelodeon, the one where the ice and soda machines are kept, along with two big buckets of oil for making popcorn. Baker was lying on top of the buckets.

“He looked like a cat, curled up asleep,” Cunningham said.

Chance Baker worked like a machine. And then the machine started to break down.

ROCKING, TURNING INWARD

Early in 2016, co-workers at both the Hampton Inn and Nickelodeon started noticing changes in Baker’s behavior. “He started turning inward and getting quiet,” Dyar said.

Then came strange incidents. Rocking under the desk. Claiming that someone had infiltrated the computer systems.

Dyar stepped out of the back office one night to find him sitting on the floor, surrounded by a dozen of the black binders they used for accounting purposes. He had spread them out around him. “He looked up and said, ‘I am looking for an earring.'” By the next night he was fine.

“Whatever happened to him seemed to happen all at once,” Cunningham said. Baker shared paranoid fantasies with Cunningham. “He had this whole elaborate theory that people were trying to kill him.”

Baker had not been in any trouble with the law for nearly three years. But on June 23 the Portland police were called to his apartment building on Marginal Way. Baker had told the building’s manager that there were explosives in his apartment and that he was going to remove them himself.

The police arrived and found no explosives, but they did find a grow operation for psychedelic mushrooms and a clearly unbalanced Baker.

They took him to Maine Medical Center for a medical evaluation.

One of the officers sent to remove the contraband was Portland police Sgt. Nicholas Goodman, a special agent of the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, although he and Baker did not cross paths that day.

Later, at ‘Til Death Tattoo, Baker recounted the story of the explosives to Mike Day. “He firmly believed that they were still in there,” Day said. “That a woman from the apartment below came up and took them so that the police wouldn’t find them.”

Day enjoyed Baker’s eccentricities, from the layered-on clothing to the wild ideas he had for tattoos, and had never found him aggressive or scary, but the young man’s conviction that someone was trying to blow up his apartment was the last straw. The staff decided it was time to end Baker’s apprenticeship.

Around this time, Baker told Dyar he was scared. He did not understand what was happening to him. “I think I had a seizure,” he told her. Maybe his childhood epilepsy was coming back. He’d been in the middle of his cleaning job at the apartment building and then blacked out. “He told me, ‘All I remember is I was doing my job and the next thing I know, I am being yelled at.’ ”

She was with him on the night of his last shift at the hotel on July 7. Cunningham was mopping the floor when Baker arrived. “He seemed a little off,” Cunningham said. He followed Baker into the break room and saw him struggling to clock in. Cunningham told him he should go home, but Baker ignored him.

The Temptations were in town to play a concert at the Maine State Pier and were guests at the Hampton Inn that night. One member of the R&B group was staying in a room on a floor right above the staff room.

Baker tried to enter that guest’s room at least twice, Dyar said, and the guest was alarmed. Tasha Sheff-Horton was called into work at 2 a.m. “We had to send Chance home,” she said. “I think he didn’t get it at all. I think he was really sad.”

The next day he was fired. Baker told his co-workers he’d been drinking the night before and apologized profusely.

“I think he was trying to self-medicate,” Sheff-Horton said.

His friends rarely saw him in an altered state, but knew he drank a little, used psychedelic mushrooms on occasion and may have smoked pot or used K2, a synthetic drug also known as Spice.

Jenna Mehnert, the executive director of the Maine chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Health, stressed that she is not a clinician and never met Baker. But for people who are experiencing psychosis, self-medication is “incredibly common.”

“When your reality is not everybody else’s reality, life gets a lot harder,” Mehnert said. “And then when you turn to substances, your reality is altered but it is very much altered by you.”

THREE JOBS AND A HOME, GONE

In the course of three or four weeks, Chance David Baker was out of all three jobs as well as a place to live. He stopped answering texts from his friends. He left a backpack on the street containing a bottle of whiskey and an appointment card for Preble Street Resource Center.

Cunningham called the Bakers in Iowa to update them on Chance, particularly on the incident at his apartment building. His mother and grandmother both began to wonder about his mental health. He’d never been diagnosed.

“You know, I think about the age period when schizophrenia evolves in young men,” Terry Baker said. “Chance was in that range.”

According to Mehnert, onsets of schizophrenia typically happen between ages 18 and 30, with the majority in the range between 18 to 24.

A 2012 Maine Sunday Telegram investigation of police-related shootings found that 42 percent of people shot by the police since 2000 – and 58 percent of those who died as a result – had suffered from mental illness. There have been 53 officer-related shootings between Jan. 1, 2012, and December 2017 and 28 people died from deadly police force during that time.

Baker’s mother, Shantel, kept calling, but he didn’t return their calls. Frantic, they filed a missing persons report with Portland police on Aug. 30. “They told me they had a million mental health issues out there and that I needed to put my shoes on and come find him yourself,” Shantel Baker said.

But neither she nor Terry had the money to come to Portland.

Chance Baker dropped by ‘Til Death Tattoo now and then, not seeming to understand he didn’t work there anymore. Day thinks he may have been sleeping on the rocks near the Eastern Promenade. Others heard he was in Tent City, a homeless encampment behind a strip mall on Brighton Avenue. On Sept. 1, Portland police Detective Christopher Giesecke reached Baker on his cellphone and recorded him saying he was ignoring his family and did not wish to speak to them.

He played it for Shantel and Terry Baker.

“We told him, ‘That was not Chance,’ ” Shantel Baker said. “‘That was his voice, but that was not my son.'”

In October, a police officer stationed near the Oxford Street shelter saw Baker acting strangely, “clearly behaving in a manner that questioned his mental health.” He was playing with a bag of dog feces. He rolled in it. Police and shelter workers approached him, and called the Home Team, a group of outreach staffers who transport intoxicated people to the city’s so-called “wet” shelter for drunks.

But they declined to take him because of drug use, an officer wrote in a report. Police called for EMTs to evaluate him, but found no medical reason to transport him. Baker also reached into his pants and exposed himself to a female Home Team worker.

She gives much credit to Portland for training its officers to deal with situations like this. “I’m going to tell you, Portland is where you are going to get the best outcome with a mental health call,” Mehnert added.

There simply wasn’t a better alternative, she said. He couldn’t go to the shelter, because he would have been disruptive. What Baker needed was a clinical assessment center, and time with the kind of personnel who could gain his trust and develop a plan for medications for him, she said. Even medical evaluators at a hospital would not be able to detain him unless he met the standard – meaning that he posed an imminent danger to himself or others.

The only time he did that was on the day he was shot.

STARLINGS IN THE TREES

Terry Baker remembers how the black starlings would gather in the trees outside her house. “They would just sit there and squawk and carry on,” she said. She’d call to her grandson. “I would tell Chance, ‘Get that BB gun and go out there and scare them.’ ”

“This is Iowa,” she said. “Everybody and their dog has a BB gun.”

On Chance David Baker’s last morning in the city he loved, he bought an air rifle. It shot pellets, but would have been much like the BB gun he used as a kid.

There’s been a lot of speculation about why, but opinions differ even among his friends. They had lost track of him. He had stopped answering Tasha Sheff-Horton’s texts, her offers to let him stay in her guest room. His family believes he was staying with a friend. Some thought he was sleeping in a tent somewhere. Day wondered if he was camping out near the Eastern Promenade. Many wondered whether the air rifle might have been his idea of a way to protect himself on the streets, from dangers real and imagined. Around December, Bilodeau ran into him on the street in the morning, on his way to get a new Social Security card; he’d lost his. He was working, doing day labor. She asked him how his apartment was, but “he didn’t want to talk about it.” He was still smiling, still saying things were fine.

“Every time I saw him he was the same Chance, always looking for the silver lining,” Bilodeau said.

A DOOMED PURCHASE

On the footage from the security camera outside the Coastal Trading & Pawn, Baker stumbles into view. He pauses, leans back, raises his chin, looks toward the door, nods, regains his balance and pushes open the door.

﻿

Underneath his grandfather’s coat, he wore a black sweatshirt with its hood pulled over a dark-blue baseball cap. Baker pulled an earbud from his ear. He was always listening to music, his friends said, often loudly.

Once inside, he browsed, swaying slightly, picking up DVDs, a hunting bow and in the same aisle, a pump-style, B3 .177-caliber, single-shot pellet rifle equipped with a scope.

He looked through the scope, aiming it toward the front wall of the store.

Security video footage captures the arrival of a visibly intoxicated Chance Baker at the pawn shop where he purchased the pellet gun moments before the fatal encounter. Video footage courtesy of Office of the Attorney General

This store is one of six pawnshops in Maine run by Rick LaChapelle. Although they don’t sell many real guns at the Union Station Plaza location, save for couple of antique rifles hung high on a wall, the businesses collectively have a federal firearms license, meaning they have the option to buy and sell guns at any of their locations.

Federal law gives gun-sellers latitude to refuse a sale of a firearm to anyone for any reason.

But there is no such law for air guns and pellet guns, and in Maine, among the few regulations of air-powered weapons is the minimum age, 16, to purchase one.

Baker manipulated the pump lever, the mechanism that builds up the air pressure that when released, sends the pellet screaming down the barrel at up to 500 feet per second.

After 90 seconds with the rifle in his hands, he walked directly to the counter, standing up straight, the way he had back at the Hampton Inn, and paid $79 for the gun.

LaChapelle, who was vacationing outside the country, did not respond to a request for comment about what guidelines he gives employees about when they should refuse to sell someone a weapon, even if it is not a firearm.

‘DEFINITELY A BB GUN’

Baker stumbled out of the store and onto the sidewalk with the rifle in his hands. Once outside, he paused again, propping himself against a metal railing, and then tumbling to the ground.

Two passers-by helped him up.

Around 11:07 a.m., Baker cut a diagonal path from the sidewalk in front of Coastal Trading across the parking lot.

He wound his way along rows of parked cars in front of Maine Hardware, where an employee who noticed him was the first to call police at 11:11 a.m.

Beyond the rows of cars was the Subway. Baker approached the sandwich store’s side door.

Another 911 call came in, reporting that there was a drunken man in the Union Station shopping plaza who was screaming obscenities and waving around a rifle or shotgun.

A minute later, a woman told 911 that he was pointing the gun, and that there were people all around. “I’m freaking out,” she said.

At 11:13 a.m., another caller told police “he’s a mess,” and that he wasn’t sure whether the rifle was an air rifle, such as a BB gun, or a .22-caliber firearm, but the caller then reversed himself.

It was “definitely a BB gun.”

CONVERGENCE OF CRUISERS

At the police station on Middle Street, Sgt. Nicholas Goodman was nearly five hours into his shift when the police radio crackled to life. Trained in conflict de-escalation and a member of the department’s specialized tactical team, Goodman took command and raced the roughly 3 miles to the scene, telling his officers to set up a perimeter to contain the gunman. Don’t approach him, Goodman told his fellow officers.

As the police officers pointed their cruisers toward Congress Street and St. John Street, Union Station Plaza was bustling. There was snow piled high in the corners of the parking lot and the pavement was damp with runoff. People were washing clothes and buying cellphones and furniture and snow shovels. An early lunch crowd was arriving, and the State of Maine 8 Ball Championship tournament was getting started at Union Station Billiards.

Portland police Officer Kyle Andrew Knutson was the first to arrive at 11:15 a.m.. Goodman asked him over the radio: What kind of firearm did the man have?

“He’s got a long gun of some sort,” Knutson said.

At 11:16 a.m., a dispatcher told Goodman about the caller’s suggestion it was an air rifle, which uses only compressed air to fire a pellet, and is not typically lethal to humans.

“We’re not going to start guessing now,” Goodman replied, then signed off his radio as he pulled up, parking his cruiser across Congress Street behind the Key Bank building. His was among a total of 12 cruisers converging on the scene.

“He’s pumping it like a BB gun but …” Knutson said at 11:17 a.m. across the police radio.

Together the two officers peered around the corner, across Congress Street. They needed to cross the street and get closer, Goodman said. He did not want civilians between him and the threat, 100 yards away. Both men, armed with police-issued .223 carbine rifles, crossed the three-lane roadway and stood shoulder-to-shoulder behind a rusty pickup truck.

They were only 35 yards away now. It was 11:18 a.m. – seven minutes after the first 911 call and two minutes after Goodman parked his cruiser.

“Drop your firearm!” Goodman yelled to the man. “Drop your rifle!”

It’s possible Baker might not have heard him. He was drunk – at least three times the legal limit to drive – and from the surveillance tape outside the pawnshop, it appears he was still wearing at least one earbud.

Goodman saw Baker “engage in activity with the rifle which led him to believe that he was in a ‘search’ for a potential target,” according to the attorney general’s investigative report.

Baker turned to the crowd with the gun barrel held parallel to the ground, but then turned back and leaned the weapon against the wall of the building.

Goodman hoped that Baker was about to surrender, and he called out to warn him that if he picked the rifle back up, he’d be shot.

Baker pulled a half-full bottle of Colt 45 malt liquor from his jacket pocket, drank from it and picked up the rifle again. Someone in the crowd nearby said he heard a trigger click.

In the midst of this standoff, a woman, who has never been identified, walked past Baker and into the Subway.

Goodman told Knutson that they could not allow Baker to get into the sandwich shop.

Then Baker, with the rifle held at waist level and its barrel parallel to the ground, turned toward Goodman and Knutson, according to the investigative report. Someone in the crowd yelled that Baker was either pulling the trigger or that his weapon had jammed.

The 15-year police veteran squeezed the trigger.

The bullet struck Baker on the left side of his skull above the ear. He fell immediately to the ground, a pool of blood staining the asphalt around his head. Police cuffed him, and by 11:37 a.m. he arrived at Maine Medical Center’s trauma unit. At 11:56 a.m. he was pronounced dead.

2 MINUTES 35 SECONDS

In the days after his death, Black Lives Matter activists rallied to protest Baker’s killing. Baker was biracial, a light-skinned man with pale blue eyes. His mother and grandmother do not believe race factored into his death. What they question is the speed at which the scene in the shopping center unfolded, and why a greater effort was not made to de-escalate the situation.

Peggy Akers, the Preble Street volunteer who used to hug Baker when she saw him at the Nickelodeon, wrote a letter to Attorney General Janet Mills, questioning why the department’s mental health liaisons were not on the scene.

“Chance had been on PPD and their mental health liaisons’ radar for the entire year leading up to his death,” Akers wrote. “I can not stop thinking about how differently things could have gone if a mental health liaison had been dispatched with PPD that day.”

Goodman was on the scene a total of 2 minutes and 35 seconds before shooting Baker. He had used deadly force once before on the job, killing a Portland man named Albert Wayne Kittrell in 2008, after Kittrell fled a traffic stop and dragged Goodman on the side of his car for 280 feet.

Baker’s mother and grandmother came to Portland to handle the funeral arrangements, raising money from friends and family in Iowa. They stayed at the Econo Lodge near the airport. They met some of Baker’s friends. They stayed four days, and then they went home, although not with Chance’s body. They couldn’t afford that.

“We are poor people,” Terry Baker said.

Instead they had him cremated. “That was the only way we could bring him home,” she said. “To have to hold him on our laps, after being shot by the police and not understanding the reason for it.”

“Chance should be alive,” she added. “He should not be gone.”

Peggy Akers wishes she could have taken the kind boy from Iowa home with her and kept him safe there. But, Akers said, she frequently feels that way at Preble Street.

“You wish you could take them all home with you,” she said. “There are a lot of other Chances. I wish that wasn’t true.”

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/18/loved-ones-believe-undiagnosed-mental-illness-led-chance-baker-to-a-series-of-bad-decisions-and-the-sights-of-a-gun/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1334155_955457-20170218_shooting_3.jpgONE YEAR AGO TODAY: A pellet rifle and a bandanna-covered bottle of malt liquor remain at the scene of the St. John Street strip mall in Portland where Chance Baker, 22, was shot by police. Security video footage captures the arrival of a visibly intoxicated Baker at the pawn shop where he purchased the pellet gun moments before the fatal encounter.Sun, 18 Feb 2018 18:28:18 +0000Driver seriously injured in Naples crash during police chasehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/17/brownfield-man-crashes-during-police-chase/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/17/brownfield-man-crashes-during-police-chase/#respondSat, 17 Feb 2018 15:48:49 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/17/brownfield-man-crashes-during-police-chase/A Brownfield man was seriously injured in a crash during a police chase in Naples early Saturday.

Richard Nicholson, 25, will face several charges following the crash on Route 11 at 2:13 a.m., the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office reported in a statement.

Police said sheriff’s Deputy Todd McGee spotted Nicholson speeding on Route 302. McGee pursued Nicholson for about a mile at 90 mph, then Nicholson turned his 2002 Chevrolet Cavalier onto Route 11, lost control and struck a utility pole, breaking it in half. Nicholson was thrown from the vehicle, landing in a snowbank.

He was taken to Bridgton Hospital.

Police said his injuries were serious but not life-threatening.

Police said Nicholson will be charged with eluding a police officer, operating under the influence and criminal speeding.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/17/brownfield-man-crashes-during-police-chase/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/RIMG0614.jpgFEB. 17, 2018 NAPLES A Brownfield man was seriously injured when he crashed a Chevrolet Cavalier on Route 11 in Naples early Saturday morning during a police chase.Sat, 17 Feb 2018 19:32:24 +0000Two plead guilty to charges in drug-related killing in Mainehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/two-plead-guilty-to-charges-in-drug-related-killing-in-maine/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/two-plead-guilty-to-charges-in-drug-related-killing-in-maine/#respondSat, 17 Feb 2018 01:58:59 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/two-plead-guilty-to-charges-in-drug-related-killing-in-maine/HOULTON — Two of three Massachusetts residents charged in a drug-related killing in northern Maine have pleaded guilty.

Tia Ludwick of Leominster pleaded guilty to felony murder and robbery on Thursday as jury selection was about to get started in Houlton. Another defendant, Darin Goulding, pleaded guilty the day before to robbery.

A third defendant, Marcus Asante, of Fitchburg, Massachusetts, is awaiting trial in November.

The victim, Douglas Morin, was found in his car on Oct. 16, 2016, in Sherman.

Ludwick’s attorney, Steve Smith, said the group drove from Massachusetts for a drug deal with her cousin, and she had no idea anyone was going to be killed.

Under a plea agreement, a murder charge was dropped against Goulding. Sentencing dates have not been set for Goulding and Ludwick.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/two-plead-guilty-to-charges-in-drug-related-killing-in-maine/feed/0Fri, 16 Feb 2018 20:58:59 +0000Richmond man shot himself at home just before being arrested, police sayhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/richmond-man-shot-himself-at-home-just-before-being-arrested-police-say/
Fri, 16 Feb 2018 21:50:06 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/richmond-man-shot-himself-at-home-just-before-being-arrested-police-say/RICHMOND — A local man who shot and killed himself Thursday at his home was about to be arrested for allegedly receiving stolen property, including a motorboat, when he grabbed a handgun out of his truck and shot himself in front of authorities, according to police.

Jesse James Melanson, 33, of Richmond, was about to be arrested by a Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office deputy, assisted by Richmond police Chief Scott MacMaster, at his home on Alexander Reed Road when he asked for permission to go to his garage to get his garage door opener, according to Steve McCausland, spokesman for the state Department of Public Safety. Once in his garage, he went into his truck parked inside, and got a handgun.

Following a brief struggle with the deputy and MacMaster, McCausland said, the two officers “backed off slightly, and that’s when (Melanson) shot himself. It all took place in the garage, in the pickup truck.”

He shot himself in the head and died, McCausland said.

Deputies with the sheriff’s office had gone to Melanson’s home with a search warrant Wednesday as part of an investigation into stolen property. McCausland said they saw other items during that search that prompted them to get another search warrant and return Thursday afternoon.

McCausland said he thinks the search was underway when the shooting occurred. He said Melanson was going to be charged with receiving stolen property. A motorboat that police had towed from the scene following the approximately 2 p.m. incident was one of the items sought in the search warrant, according to police.

McCausland said he did not expect the state attorney general’s office to investigate the incident as an officer-involved shooting.

Peter Pelletier, 51, has been charged with two counts of unlawful sexual contact, one count of unlawful sexual touching, assault and endangering the welfare of a child. The specifics of the charges against Pelletier, who lives in Biddeford, indicated that the alleged victim is a relative.

Pelletier was the softball coach at the high school from 2007 to 2012, school officials said. He was an unpaid volunteer assistant coach in 2015 and 2016 and has had no contact with the team since 2016, officials said.

The school department also said they have received no complaints about Pelletier from his time as either a paid coach or as a volunteer.

Pelletier was released this week on $5,000 bail. He will be arraigned March 5 and his next court date after that time is May 17.

]]>https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2016/09/238744-20160901_FirstDay_01.jpgBIDDEFORD, ME - SEPTEMBER 1:Students at Biddeford High School wait outside before the start of school on the first day, Thursday, September 1, 2016. Biddeford has its high school students starting at 8:30 in the morning, where previously the day started at 7:35. (Photo by Carl D. Walsh/Staff Photographer)Fri, 16 Feb 2018 14:49:12 +0000Someone’s deliberately scattering roofing nails on a busy Maine roadhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/waldoboro-police-warn-of-black-nails-on-busy-route-220/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/waldoboro-police-warn-of-black-nails-on-busy-route-220/#respondFri, 16 Feb 2018 15:10:44 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/waldoboro-police-warn-of-black-nails-on-busy-route-220/Police are warning motorists who travel Route 220/Washington Road North in Waldoboro that someone is deliberately leaving roofing nails spray-painted black in the roadway.

So far, at least half-a-dozen motorists have had to deal with flat and ruined tires as a result of the nails.

“They’re always in the same spot, all the time, so we believe it is somebody who is intentionally placing them there,” said Police Chief Bill Labombarde. He added that the black paint makes the nails more difficult to spot.

The motivation for the act is unclear, but he said it is definitely an individual and likely an adult. “I think the person may have an issue with people driving fast on that road.”

It’s not the first time issues have arisen on the road. Large piles of brush have been dragged into the road in the past as an obstacle for motorists.

An investigation is underway into who is responsible.

“It’s dangerous, someone is going to get hurt, more so than a speeding car,”Labombarde said. “If anyone has any information, or if anyone has fallen victim to this, let us know.”

Anyone with information is asked to email police at hesseltine@waldoboromaine.org.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/waldoboro-police-warn-of-black-nails-on-busy-route-220/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/shutterstock_108060560.jpgSat, 17 Feb 2018 06:24:26 +0000Maine man guilty of growing hundreds of pot plants without a licensehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/man-pleads-guilty-to-running-large-marijuana-growing-facility-in-waldo-county/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/man-pleads-guilty-to-running-large-marijuana-growing-facility-in-waldo-county/#respondFri, 16 Feb 2018 14:07:43 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/man-pleads-guilty-to-running-large-marijuana-growing-facility-in-waldo-county/An Etna man faces up to 20 years in prison for running a sophisticated indoor marijuana growing facility in the Waldo County town of Frankfort.

James Mansfield, 33, pleaded guilty Thursday in U.S. District Court to conspiring to manufacture, distribute and possess with intent to distribute marijuana. Investigators seized 400 plants from the grow facility, according to a statement issued by U.S. Attorney Halsey B. Frank.

An investigation by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration found Mansfield conspired with others to illegally manufacture and distribute marijuana between October 2010 and August 2016, according to court records. He was not registered as a marijuana caregiver with the Department of Health and Human Services and the location of the facility was not reported to the department.

In May 2016, federal law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at the facility and recovered about 400 marijuana plants, 295 marijuana root balls and paraphernalia used to manufacture and process marijuana, according to court records.

In January, 33-year-old Nicholas Reynolds pleaded guilty to multiple charges related to his role in the marijuana operation.

Mansfield faces up to 20 years in prison, three years to life of supervised release and a $1 million fine. He will be sentenced at a later date.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/16/man-pleads-guilty-to-running-large-marijuana-growing-facility-in-waldo-county/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/12/1296197_AP_17212613743022.jpgMarijuana plants bloom at a laboratory in Natural Ventures in Caguas, Puerto Rico. There is growing evidence that marijuana availability reduces demand for alcohol.Fri, 16 Feb 2018 12:48:16 +0000Maine attorney general wants to find out why police deadly force is risinghttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/mills-forms-task-force-to-examine-officers-use-of-deadly-force/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/mills-forms-task-force-to-examine-officers-use-of-deadly-force/#respondFri, 16 Feb 2018 03:22:24 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/mills-forms-task-force-to-examine-officers-use-of-deadly-force/Maine’s attorney general says she is not satisfied with her office simply investigating a police officer’s use of deadly force to determine if it was justified.

Janet Mills wants a select group of experts to dig a little deeper to see if they can figure out why officers are being thrust into more and more volatile situations, some of which result in an officer having to resort to deadly force.

“The dramatic increase in the number of police-involved deadly force incidents in the last few years deserves a broader analysis of the cause of such events,” Mills wrote in a letter to the 13 members of the task force.

She said her office investigated the use of deadly force by police six times in 2016 and 13 times in 2017.

Only two of the incidents from 2016 resulted in death.

“I want this panel to do a broader analysis. There are a lot of issues in play including domestic violence, substance abuse, people barricading themselves in a home and mental health issues,” Mills said.

“Are there things that police officers could be doing differently? We need to find out what’s going on in our society.”

“We welcome the formation of the task force. We can no longer simply ask whether the decision to shoot someone was legally justified. We have to ask what could have been done differently in the minutes, days and even months beforehand to prevent the situation from ever happening,” Alison Beyea, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine, said in a statement.

Mills said the 13-member task force will meet for the first time on March 6 in Augusta. Mills said the task force will have access to case files from the Attorney General’s Office and from local police, but they will not have any special powers – such as the authority to subpoena witnesses or examine psychiatric records.

Mills said the task force, which will meet for several months, will likely be asked to develop recommendations for preventing the use of deadly force.

Mills said the task force will be chaired by Matt Brown, a retired federal probation officer, who currently works in crisis intervention training.

She also invited Sen. Bill Diamond and Rep. Patrick W. Corey, who both serve on the Legislature’s Joint Standing Committed on Criminal Justice and Public Safety, as well as Lt. John Cote of the Maine State Police, Assistant Attorney General John Alsop, Debra Baeder, a state forensic examiner and a representative from the Maine Coalition to End Domestic Violence to serve on the panel.

Portland Press Herald Executive Editor Cliff Schechtman was among those invited to participate on the task force.

Dennis Hoey can be contacted at 791-6365 or at:

dhoey@pressherald.com

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/mills-forms-task-force-to-examine-officers-use-of-deadly-force/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/10/1273190_894225-Mills.jpgAUGUSTA, ME - NOVEMBER. 15: Attorney General Janet Mills speaks about how to detect and avoid senior scams on Tuesday November 15, 2016 at the University of Maine at Augusta. She was speaking at a lunch and learn event put on by the Aging Onward Forum. The sponsors of that include UMA, UMA Senior College and Husson University.(Photo by Joe Phelan/Staff Photographer)Fri, 16 Feb 2018 16:06:25 +0000Man pointed gun at officer before being shot in Machiasport, says prosecutorhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/man-pointed-gun-at-officer-before-being-shot-in-machiasport-says-prosecutor/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/man-pointed-gun-at-officer-before-being-shot-in-machiasport-says-prosecutor/#respondFri, 16 Feb 2018 01:27:11 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/man-pointed-gun-at-officer-before-being-shot-in-machiasport-says-prosecutor/MACHIASPORT — Authorities say a Maine man was pointing a gun before a law enforcement officer opened fire, injuring the man and his girlfriend.

An attorney for Jason Jackson previously told the Bangor Daily News that he was unarmed when he was shot Dec. 9 in Machiasport. But Washington County District Attorney Matthew Foster says Jackson was repeatedly setting his gun down and picking it up. Foster says Marine Patrol Officer Matt Carter saw Jackson’s finger near the trigger when he opened fire.

Jackson and his girlfriend were both shot several times.

The Attorney General’s Office is investigating the shooting.

Police say Jackson was a suspect in an armed home invasion earlier in the day. He faces charges including robbery, burglary and threatening with a dangerous weapon.

Kevin O’Connor, 35, was stuck in his car with serious injuries for 10 hours Wednesday morning after he lost control of the vehicle. Police said it went airborne and struck an unoccupied house on Harpswell Islands Road around midnight Tuesday. He suffered multiple broken limbs and a head injury in the crash, according to the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office.

O’Connor could not get out of the car, and his cellphone battery was dead. A passer-by finally discovered the crash at 10 a.m. Wednesday and called police. O’Connor was transported to Maine Medical Center in Portland, where he was in fair condition Thursday. He declined an interview request through the Maine Medical Center communications office.

The sheriff’s office said Thursday that O’Connor will be charged with operating after a license suspension, improper plates and failure to provide insurance.

His driving record shows a history of violations for speeding, failure to wear a seatbelt and driving a vehicle that was not properly registered or insured. Most recently, his license and registration were suspended Feb. 6 for failure to file insurance.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/injured-driver-who-spent-10-hours-in-crashed-car-will-face-criminal-charges/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1331987_851954-Harpswell-Crash-1024.jpgAfter going airborne and slamming into the home's roof, the car came to rest against the structure's exterior wall.Thu, 15 Feb 2018 22:44:43 +0000Police: Man died from self-inflicted gunshot as officers searched homehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/police-man-died-from-self-inflicted-gunshot-as-officers-searched-home/
Thu, 15 Feb 2018 22:34:28 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/police-man-died-from-self-inflicted-gunshot-as-officers-searched-home/RICHMOND — Maine State Police are investigating an apparently self-inflicted shooting death that occurred Thursday as authorities were conducting a search warrant on Alexander Reed Road.

Police did not release the identity of the person who was shot or any details about the search warrant except that it was related to stolen property and occurred around 2 p.m. Thursday.

Steve McCausland, spokesman for the Maine Department of Public Safety, said state police detectives were working with Richmond police to investigate the shooting. He said the person who was shot died and all indications were that the death resulted from a self-inflicted wound.

Chief Scott MacMaster, of the Richmond police, said his department responded to assist members of the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office at 843 Alexander Reed Road. Sheriff’s officials were executing a search warrant as part of an investigation into stolen property when the incident occurred.

]]>https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/cop-clip-41-2.jpgpolice for featured imageThu, 15 Feb 2018 19:32:44 +0000Students in Augusta and Caribou cited for making threats at school this weekhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/students-in-augusta-and-caribou-cited-for-making-threats-at-school-this-week/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/students-in-augusta-and-caribou-cited-for-making-threats-at-school-this-week/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 21:29:59 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/students-in-augusta-and-caribou-cited-for-making-threats-at-school-this-week/Students in Augusta and Caribou have been cited for terrorizing after allegedly making threats at their schools on Tuesday.

A male student at Cony High School in Augusta was issued a summons for terrorizing after faculty learned about an alleged threat involving a firearm, according to Augusta police. The school resource officer interviewed the boy and determined he was unlikely to act on the threat, but police credited school officials for assisting in the case and plan to forward the case to the district attorney for prosecution.

Meanwhile, a 13-year-old student at Caribou Middle School faces a Class D terrorizing charge after allegedly leaving a written bomb threat in one of the school’s bathrooms on Tuesday, News Center Maine reported.

Both boys have been released to their parents.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/students-in-augusta-and-caribou-cited-for-making-threats-at-school-this-week/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/10/download.jpgThu, 15 Feb 2018 20:35:13 +0000Bingham man arrested after Somerset County chase, crashhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/bingham-man-arrested-after-somerset-county-chase-crash/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/bingham-man-arrested-after-somerset-county-chase-crash/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 21:19:07 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/bingham-man-arrested-after-somerset-county-chase-crash/A Bingham man was in custody Thursday after a police chase through several Somerset County towns that ended when the man’s car crashed into a building and he was arrested.

James Ross, chief deputy in the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office, said the ordeal began about 4 p.m. Wednesday when a deputy was sent in response to a report of a burglary in progress on Embden Pond Road in North Anson.

Deputy Isaac Wacome got names of suspects from relatives of the burglary victim, and while driving by the home of one of the suspects, he saw a car in the driveway with no registration plates.

Hours later, about 10:30 p.m., Wacome saw the car again, this time in Madison and with a registration plate that did not belong on the vehicle. Wacome followed the car and activated his blue lights and siren.

Ross said the deputy saw the car speed up in an attempt to get away, traveling east on Thurston Hill Road toward U.S. Route 201 at Twelve Corners, where a passenger jumped out of the vehicle and started running. Wacome continued to pursue the vehicle north on U.S. Route 201 into Solon village, west onto Ferry Street then south on Kennebec River Road, which turns into Solon Road and Main Street in North Anson village.

Ross said road conditions were bare and dry with little traffic. Speeds briefly reached 100 mph on U.S. 201, he said.

“At this point the vehicle operator blew a front tire, losing control of the car,” Ross said. “The car then sideswiped a building housing New Portland Custom Cycles, causing damage to the building.”

The car’s driver, identified as Michael Richardson, 28, of Bingham, was not injured and was arrested immediately, Ross said.

The vehicle was towed by Ray’s Towing, of Madison. Cpl. Gene Cole assisted at the scene. The investigation remains open.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/bingham-man-arrested-after-somerset-county-chase-crash/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/BinghamCrash.jpgA police chase that topped 100 mph through several Somerset County towns Thursday ended when the car blew a tire and crashed into a building.Thu, 15 Feb 2018 16:52:12 +0000Trial of Windham man accused of murdering wife postponed as he again changes lawyershttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/gaston-murder-trial-postponed-to-november/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/gaston-murder-trial-postponed-to-november/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 20:53:04 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/gaston-murder-trial-postponed-to-november/Noah Gaston, a Windham man accused of killing his wife in early 2016, is now scheduled to stand trial in November.

Gaston’s trial has been delayed several times as he changed lawyers. He hired his third legal team, headed by Robert C. Andrews and Merritt Heminway, this month.

Noah Gaston of Windham will stand trial in the January 2016 shooting death of his wife, Alicia Gaston. 2016 Press Herald File Photo/Derek Davis

Gaston is accused of killing his wife, Alicia Gaston, 34, early on Jan. 14, 2016. He claimed that his wife had gotten up early that day and he mistook her for an intruder and shot her as she came up the stairs. He faces a charge of murder.

Alicia Gaston

Police questioned his account from the beginning, when he initially said that he fired his shotgun when his wife was halfway up the stairs and then said he shot at a figure at the bottom of the stairs. But police said the evidence indicated she was at or near the top of the stairs and only a few feet from where Gaston said he was when he fired the gun.

Gaston also said he and his wife had not been arguing the morning of the shooting, but the couple’s two daughters, who were 8 and 9 at the time, said their parents were arguing. The couple also have a son, and all three children have been placed with relatives since the shooting.

Gaston was denied bail in the case and has been jailed since the shooting.

The trial had been scheduled to begin this month, but was delayed after Gaston fired his second team of lawyers.

“They had some issues and their relationship broke down,” Andrews said of the most recent change in lawyers.

He declined to say what the issues were and said he doesn’t have enough of a familiarity with the case to discuss legal strategies yet.

Randy Marquis, 44, of Augusta, was convicted March 23, 2017, of three counts of possession of sexually explicit materials depicting children under 12 — specifically two separate images and one video — on the computer in his Northern Avenue home. The state maintained he had the images on Jan. 16, 2015, the day officers came to his home to question him.

Marquis was sentenced in April 2017 to an initial six months behind bars, and the remainder of the three-year term was suspended while he spends two years on probation. He is currently on probation.

Marquis, through his attorney, Scott Hess, appealed his the conviction to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, which heard oral arguments in the case Thursday at the Cumberland County Courthouse.

Hess on Thursday concentrated his oral argument on whether the investigators had consent to enter Marquis’ home. A judge ruled earlier that Marquis had “acquiesced” to their entrance, so the evidence obtained could be used at the trial.

“Mr. Marquis ‘didn’t invite them in or lead them in,’” Hess told the justices.

Chief Justice Leigh Saufley asked, “Why does it matter whether there was a consent to enter?”

She noted that Marquis gave the officers consent to look at his computer.

Associate Justice Joseph Jabar also asked, “How does it impact consent to search the computer?”

“Anything that happened after the entry of the home is fruit of the poisonous tree,” Hess said. That refers to evidence obtained by a illegal search, which then would be unusable at trial.

Hess said, “There has to be an affirmative measure of consent.”

Associate Justice Thomas Humphrey and noted on the audio recording, Maine State Police Detective Justin Kittredge told Marquis many times, “I don’t have a warrant. You don’t have to let me do this.”

Assistant District Attorney Frayla Tarpinian, who was also the prosecutor at the trial, maintained that rulings in the case were proper and the conviction on the three charges should stand.

Tarpinian told the justices that the entire encounter from January 2014 is recorded on an audio tape. She said shortly after the three state police investigators enter the house, Marquis says he knows about the child pornography and “leads them to the computer; he manipulates the mouse.”

Associate Justice Ellen Gorman said the officers initially entered “on the pretext of checking Mr. Marquis Sr.’s taxi problems,” an apparent reference to a taxi business in which Randy Marquis was involved, and asked, “Why do law enforcement officers lie to gain someone’s trust?”

Tarpinian told her that can enable them to get information they might not otherwise get. She also said the pretext was short-lived.

The justices too were concerned about the more than two-year time lapse from the initial charge to the trial.

Tarpinian said there were some delays in pre-trial motions and hearings as well as continuances. She also told the justices that Marquis was not in custody during that period.

The high court issues its opinion in writing, and those decisions are published Tuesdays and Thursdays on the court’s website.

Marquis had pleaded not guilty to all charges and opted against testifying at his trial at the Capital Judicial Center. He also declined to speak during the sentencing hearing in the same courthouse.

Jurors heard his voice only on a recording during an interview by investigators.

Kittredge and Dawn Ego, a forensic analyst with the Maine Computer Crimes Unit, were the only two witnesses who testified.

In his closing argument at Marquis’ trial, Hess argued that Marquis was unaware he had downloaded the images.

“When the detective ran the search program and these things popped up, (Marquis) was surprised,” Hess said. “He was genuinely surprised.”

In her closing argument, Tarpinian said Marquis, under the user name “BIG DADDY,” used a peer-to-peer file sharing program and deliberately searched for pornographic terms and downloaded those images to his computer.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/augusta-man-appealing-child-porn-conviction-to-state-supreme-court/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/805288_322107_randy_marquis.jpgRANDY MARQUISThu, 15 Feb 2018 14:59:55 +0000South Portland student accused of threatening to ‘shoot up the school’https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/south-portland-high-student-in-police-custody-after-alleged-threats/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/south-portland-high-student-in-police-custody-after-alleged-threats/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 15:50:41 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/south-portland-high-student-in-police-custody-after-alleged-threats/A 15-year-old South Portland High School student was arrested Thursday morning on his way to school and charged with terrorizing after posting a message on social media about “shooting up the school,” police and school officials said.

Other students saw the message when it was posted Wednesday night on Snapchat and alerted authorities, police said. Additional police officers were sent to the school Thursday morning to provide security before the suspected student was taken into custody.

The student, a freshman whom police declined to identify because of his age, was arrested in the parking lot of the South Portland Community Center, next to the high school. The student was charged with terrorizing and carrying a concealed weapon. He had a knife, but no firearms were found, police said.

There was no imminent threat to the school, school officials said. Police had no prior contact with the student and said he appeared to have retracted his threat via social media after it was posted.

“Other students who saw this did the right thing – if you see something then say something – and the student involved was apprehended this morning before entering school,” Superintendent Ken Kunin wrote in an email to school families.

Caroline Davis, a sophomore, said she was scared, sad and mad that a fellow student had taken away the sense of security she once felt at school. It made no difference to her that the boy later posted a message that he was “just kidding,” she said.

“Mostly I’m mad,” she decided. “I don’t know what goes through a kid’s head when he threatens his classmates like that. Even if he meant it as a joke. It’s not funny.”

A boy at Cony High School in Augusta was issued a summons for terrorizing on Tuesday after faculty learned of an alleged threat involving a firearm. On the same day, a boy at Caribou Middle School was charged with terrorizing after a written bomb threat was found in a bathroom. Both students were released to their parents.

South Portland High School students said Thursday began amid confusing rumors about what had happened and heightened concern because of the increased police presence.

“We walked into school and there were a bunch of cops and two National Guardsmen in the lobby,” said Brady Doucette, a freshman who said he knew the student who was arrested but not well.

Later Thursday morning, the superintendent sent his email to the school community and teachers explained to students what had happened.

“Once everyone found out what happened, the tension left. Some kids made jokes about it,” Doucette said. “The kid who did it intended it to be a joke, but it turned into something else. It’s nothing to joke about after what happened yesterday in Florida.”

Doucette’s mother said she and a friend discussed the Florida shooting moments before she learned about the incident at South Portland High School.

“It’s crazy,” Jamie Doucette said. “We were just talking about how it could happen anywhere and then this happens.”

Several students noted how well South Portland police and school officials handled the situation, maintaining security at the high school and keeping students calm. The school was never shut down and classes were not interrupted.

“I feel it was handled really well, in a really chill way,” said Hannah Hutchins, a senior. Her friend Amelia Scofield, also a senior, agreed.

“I definitely felt they knew what to do because police were here early,” Scofield said. “The scary part was that it happened the day after the shooting in Florida. If it had happened any other day, I would have thought it wasn’t serious.”

“But it showed that it could happen here so easily,” Hutchins said.

Lt. Frank Clark said the police department will continue to work closely with the school department to ensure students are safe.

“I would like to particularly highlight and applaud those students who came forward and did the right thing by reporting these concerning posts,” Clark said. “We would also encourage parents and family members to monitor the social media accounts of their own children and their friends.”

Kunin said he could not release any additional information about the student, including his grade level or whether he had been disciplined in the past, because of federal law. He said the administration investigates every threat, no matter the disciplinary record of the student involved.

The case will be referred to the Maine Juvenile Community Corrections Office for resolution.

Kelley Bouchard can be contacted at 791-6328 or at:

kbouchard@pressherald.com

Twitter: KelleyBouchard

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/15/south-portland-high-student-in-police-custody-after-alleged-threats/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/258210-20180215_SP1610.jpgSOUTH PORTLAND, ME - FEBRUARY 15: Students leave South Portland High School at the end of the school day Wednesday, February 15, 2018. On Wednesday morning a student was arrested for terrorizing after allegedly posting a social media message about Òshooting up the school.Ó (Staff photo by Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer)Fri, 16 Feb 2018 00:10:37 +0000Police charge 4 with selling crack, heroin following Verona Island raidhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/police-charge-four-with-drug-trafficking-after-raid-on-verona-island/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/police-charge-four-with-drug-trafficking-after-raid-on-verona-island/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 02:46:59 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/police-charge-four-with-drug-trafficking-after-raid-on-verona-island/Four people were arrested Tuesday evening on Verona Island, near Bucksport, and charged with selling crack cocaine and heroin.

The Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, Hancock County Sheriff’s Office, and the Bucksport and Maine State Police raided a home at 343 East Side Drive where they seized more than 38 grams of crack cocaine and more than 41 grams of heroin.

The drugs’ combined street value was $11,000, according to a news release from Maine Department of Public Safety spokesman Steve McCausland. Police also seized more than $3,000 in suspected drug proceeds.

Robert Maddocks, 44, and Heather Godin, 44, both of Verona Island, who live in the home that was raided, were charged with unlawful trafficking of a Schedule W drug.

Cyntoine D. Sloan, 34, of Worcester, Massachusetts, and 28-year-old Rebecca Atamian of Fitchburg, Massachusetts, were also charged with trafficking.

Tina Lagasse, 52, of 527 Main St. is expected to be sentenced on the Class D misdemeanor next month. Maximum punishment for the crime is 364 days in jail.

Lagasse is free on her personal recognizance, but is barred from having contact with two witnesses in the case, one of whom is identified as the victim.

Lagasse’s attorney, Paul Corey, told the judge that a jury could have found her guilty beyond a reasonable doubt based on the facts that prosecutors were prepared to present as evidence at trial.

Tina Lagasse Photo courtesy of the Androscoggin Sheriff's Office

The case stems from an internet advertisement for prostitution that was noticed by an Auburn police detective last summer. The image showed Lagasse with a young woman who was later identified as a former Auburn high school student.

According to a police report, a Westbrook Police Department sergeant posed as a customer, texting the phone number on the ad; Lagasse answered. She texted back that the younger woman pictured with her was 17 years old and that “I don’t sell children.”

The officer called back and made an appointment with Lagasse for paid sex. She gave him her home address.

Three officers arrived at her home and questioned her about the ad and the teenager pictured in it, police said.

Lagasse told them she met the teen near Poirier’s Market on Walnut Street early on the morning of July 29. The girl was selling herself on the street and Lagasse befriended the teen and told her there was “a better way to make money.”

An Auburn high school principal told police the victim had been a student.

A subpoena for the online advertisement showed the ad had been posted after the victim’s 18th birthday.

Officer Sara Moynihan, who recognized Wyatt Wilson from previous encounters, said the cart was “filled with groceries but none of it was in bags,” and that Wyatt told her he was heading home.

In an affidavit, Moynihan said she could smell alcohol on Wilson’s breath.

Wilson couldn’t show receipts for any of the items, but told Moynihan he’d paid for everything but the alcohol. A Walmart surveillance video showed him “passing all points of sale” without paying for any items in the cart.

Moynihan arrested Wilson around 7:10 p.m.

Walmart staff, who valued the groceries at $165.32 and the shopping cart at $200, pressed charges.

Wilson made an initial appearance Wednesday at the Capital Judicial Center via video from the Kennebec County jail, and a judge set bail on the theft charge at $1,000 cash or $2,500 unsecured with a Maine Pre-trial Services contract.

Bail conditions forbid Wilson from possessing alcohol and dangerous weapons and also from returning to any Walmart.

Wilson’s criminal record includes a conviction for a January 2012 burglary of Lisa’s Restaurant on Bangor Street. Wilson was charged in that case after police found him passed out on the basement floor surrounded by open bottle of alcohol, mostly Allen’s Coffee Brandy.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/augusta-man-accused-of-stealing-shopping-cart-filled-with-groceries-booze-from-walmart/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/wyatt-wilson.jpgThu, 15 Feb 2018 13:16:54 +0000Benton man admits stealing marijuana, pot pipes, from cars in parking lothttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/benton-man-admits-stealing-marijuana-pot-pipes-from-cars-in-parking-lot/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/benton-man-admits-stealing-marijuana-pot-pipes-from-cars-in-parking-lot/#respondWed, 14 Feb 2018 18:37:25 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/14/benton-man-admits-stealing-marijuana-pot-pipes-from-cars-in-parking-lot/AUGUSTA — A thief struck a treasure trove of marijuana and pot pipes, an Under Armour jacket, a phone and about $460 in cash when he rifled through seven vehicles in a Winslow parking lot last September.

Police investigating the thefts had surveillance video that showed a suspect — later identified as Jacob Allen Kerby, 24, of Benton — trying door handles of various vehicles and getting into some of them at a parking lot on Millenium Drive, Assistant District Attorney Alisa Ross told a judge on Tuesday.

Kerby had been linked to the October 2015 daylight robbery of Casey’s Redemption Center in Fairfield. He was fresh out of prison, released Aug. 15, 2017, from the Bolduc Correctional Facility, and was on probation when the parking lot thefts occurred.

Someone had chased the thief from the parking lot and told police the man got into a Volvo and left. That same vehicle was later found at the scene of a theft reported on High Street in Winslow, Ross said. Kerby, who was a passenger, was arrested.

Kerby initially denied being at the Winslow parking lot but eventually told investigators he had a drug problem and needed help.

On Tuesday at the Capital Judicial Center, Kerby pleaded guilty to seven misdemeanor counts of burglary of a motor vehicle and three felony counts of theft, all of which occurred Sept. 28, 2017, in Winslow.

Judge Eric Walker sentenced him to three years in prison, to run concurrent with a four-year probation revocation. Kerby will not be on probation when he is released.

The sentence was recommended jointly by both the defense and the state. Kerby’s attorney, Thomas J. Nale, said he had talked to Kerby’s probation officer, who agreed that probation was not appropriate for Kerby.

Kerby said little at the hearing after answer “guilty” to all 10 charges. In exchange for the pleas, the state dismissed four other charges.

Ross said all the owners of the marijuana pipes and marijuana that had been stolen possessed medical marijuana cards.

Kerby was ordered to pay $940 restitution for the stolen cash, the jacket and other items not recovered.

Ross said the state did not seek restitution for the marijuana.

“Officers recovered five marijuana pipes, five marijuana containers and one suboxone strip,” Ross said. “A lot of the marijuana was recovered.”

Theriault, who retired in early 2014 after 20 years as Mexico’s police chief, was sworn in by Dedimus Justice Rick Micklon of Otisfield in a ceremony in the commissioners’ office of the county building on Western Avenue.

Theriault’s son Shawn pinned the sheriff’s badge on his father’s uniform.

“I’m very thankful and fortunate for the opportunity to serve as sheriff,” Theriault said after taking the oath. “I know this is going to be a challenging position, but I look forward to the opportunity that’s been afforded to me. I hope to work diligently in restoring the faith of the community and rebuilding morale in this department.”

He said he hopes to “do the position the justice it deserves.”

Theriault was appointed by LePage on Feb. 6 to serve the remainder of Wayne Gallant’s term, which ends Dec. 31.

“I want to get everybody’s confidence back into the Oxford County Sheriff’s Department,” Theriault said. “Hopefully, everyone will work with me to do that. I hope I can do it in the 11 months that I have in the position.”

He asked for “patience and cooperation” from “citizens and the media.”

“I have a few things to sort out and need to take some time to get things rolling,” he said.

Theriault said he has taken out papers to run for a full four-year term, which would make him 74 years old by the end of the term.

A third suspect remained at large Tuesday evening, according to a statement by Westbrook Police Department Capt. Sean Lally.

“The male victim had been threatened with a firearm and pistol whipped after giving a ride to three suspects,” Lally said.

Lally said the robbery victim, a male, was taken to a local hospital for treatment of his injuries. His condition is not known.

According to Lally, the victim, who knew at least one of the suspects, stopped to give them a ride. He was assaulted and robbed on Ash Street around 1:30 p.m. Police officers located two suspects matching the description given by the victim in the vicinity, one armed with a firearm.

Lally said Westbrook officers arrested 21-year-old Nadira Thomas of Westbrook along with a juvenile. They were both charged with robbery and aggravated assault. Thomas was being held on $5,000 cash bail.

Thomas was being held at the Cumberland County Jail while the juvenile was transported to the Long Creek Youth Development Center in South Portland.

Lally said investigators are not prepared to release a description of the third suspect because officers don’t want to compromise their investigation.

]]>https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/Nadira-Thomas3-e1518623134453.jpgWed, 14 Feb 2018 10:52:17 +0000Augusta woman sentenced to 4 years for probation violationhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/augusta-woman-sentenced-to-four-years-for-probation-violation/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/augusta-woman-sentenced-to-four-years-for-probation-violation/#respondTue, 13 Feb 2018 23:40:06 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/augusta-woman-sentenced-to-four-years-for-probation-violation/AUGUSTA — An Augusta woman involved in a shooting incident at the Augusta Walmart parking lot in June 2016 is heading to prison for four years for selling cocaine base this summer while on probation.

Samatha Tupper, 26, will have the rest of her eight-year sentence suspended while she spends an additional three years on probation.

The sentence was imposed after Tupper pleaded guilty Tuesday at the Capital Judicial Center to one count of aggravated trafficking in cocaine base, which occurred July 27 in Augusta.

Assistant Attorney General Katie Sibley said Tupper sold a gram of cocaine to an undercover officer.

Sibley said the new charge was classified as aggravated trafficking because of Tupper’s prior conviction, not because of the amount involved.

The judge also ordered Tupper to serve a concurrent 36 months for violating her prior probation.

Sibley told Judge Eric Walker that Tupper needed to be on probation again after serving her new sentence.

“She has to be held accountable for her conduct, but at the same time she needs to be given the tool to rehabilitate,” Sibley said. “Probation should give her those tools.

Sibley said it was “well-established that Tupper has struggled for a long period of time with substance abuse issues.”

Tupper was one of four people arrested after shots were exchanged June 26, 2016, between people in two cars in the Augusta Walmart parking lot in what police said was a dispute over money owed for drugs.

No one was shot but the fracas brought a number of charges against the individuals involved.

Police say Tupper picked one of the four people involved, Reginald McBride, and drove him to Walmart that day. After two bystanders, both legally carrying guns, broke up the shooting, she drove him back to her residence in Augusta, where police found them. Tupper later pleaded no contest and was convicted of hindering McBride’s apprehension. She was sentenced to five months in jail.

Tupper had pleaded guilty in May 2016 to unlawful trafficking in cocaine and was sentenced to an initial 45 days in jail with the remainder of her four-year sentence suspended. She was on that probation when the aggravated trafficking occurred.

McBride, now 40, of Harlem, New York, was indicted on federal firearms and drugs charges in connection with the Walmart incident, and his case is set for trial next month in U.S. District Court in Bangor.

Betty Adams can be contacted at 621-5631 or at:

badams@centralmaine.com

Twitter: @betadams

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/augusta-woman-sentenced-to-four-years-for-probation-violation/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1331527_51613_samantha_tupper.jpgSAMANTHA TUPPERTue, 13 Feb 2018 21:23:37 +0000A vehicle ran down this Maine man’s ice shack. So he’s offering a rewardhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/reward-offered-by-owner-of-ice-shack-damaged-in-wilton/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/reward-offered-by-owner-of-ice-shack-damaged-in-wilton/#respondTue, 13 Feb 2018 21:46:23 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/reward-offered-by-owner-of-ice-shack-damaged-in-wilton/WILTON — Marc Willett, of Chesterville, is offering a $200 reward to anyone with information leading to the prosecution of the driver who heavily damaged his ice shack on Wilson Pond last week.

It appears the shack was hit by an SUV or a truck, Game Warden Kyle Hladik said. Apparently at least one of the vehicle’s side windows was broken, since there was glass on the ice, he said.

Evidence suggests a vehicle knocked the shack off its blocks, sending it about 25 feet across the ice Thursday night or Friday. There is a lot of structural damage. A microwave, a lantern and a heater inside were broken, Willett said.

“We found the tire tracks of the vehicle,” he said. It came onto the ice from the back side of the pond. Tracks showed the driver hit the brakes and spun the vehicle around.

Willett said they have tried to “bandage up” the shack, which was set up for the annual Michael J. Rowe Memorial Ice Fishing Derby on Saturday. His family and friends attend, and Willett said the derby means a lot to him because he was a classmate of Rowe’s.

Hladick said anyone with information is asked to contact the Maine Warden Service through the Central Maine Regional Communications Center in Augusta at 800-452-4664.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/reward-offered-by-owner-of-ice-shack-damaged-in-wilton/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/804510_224808-Wilson-Pond-ice-shac-e1518622891836.jpgAn ice shack on Wilson Pond in Wilton was heavily damaged when it was struck by a vehicle Thursday night or Friday morning, owner Marc Willett of Chesterville said Monday. Items, including a heater, a lantern and a microwave, were broken, he said. The Maine Warden Service is investigating.Wed, 14 Feb 2018 14:59:57 +0000British exporter agrees to settle case alleging it avoided U.S. dutieshttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/cashmere-company-agrees-to-settlement-in-duties-avoidance-case/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/cashmere-company-agrees-to-settlement-in-duties-avoidance-case/#respondTue, 13 Feb 2018 20:57:04 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/13/cashmere-company-agrees-to-settlement-in-duties-avoidance-case/A British company has agreed to pay more than $900,000 to settle allegations that it structured shipments to avoid paying U.S. duties on its goods, including sales to dozens of customers in Maine.

The settlement by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Maine will require Pure Collection to pay $908,100 under the False Claims Act, a civil remedy. Most of the penalty will be paid by the company, but $32,562 will be paid by Pure Collection’s chief executive officer, Samantha Harrison, for her role in the scheme.

The company, based in Harrogate, England, sells clothing – primarily knit and cashmere sweaters – through its catalog and online.

The complaint says that Pure Collection structured its shipments to make the value of items it was sending to the U.S. under $200 to avoid import duties of up to 32 percent. Shipments valued under $200 from 2010 to March 2016, and then under $800 after that date, were not subject to duties. Breaking connected orders into smaller units to avoid the duties is barred.

The U.S. Attorney’s office said Pure Collection made the individual shipments less valuable to keep its pricing competitive with U.S. manufacturers and to avoid refunding the duties paid by customers. Shipments that are valued below the duty limit are generally sent directly to the customer, while those at a higher value are held at the Post Office, where the customers have to pay the duty before they are given the package.

Pure Collections’ policy was to reimburse customers if they paid any duties, the complaint against the company said, so higher-valued shipments would increase the refunds the company would have had to pay to customers.

“Finding a way around Customs duties freed Pure from making good on this reimbursement promise to its U.S. customers,” the complaint said, thus improving the company’s bottom line.

An internal company manual, included in the complaint against the company, instructs employees how to split shipments in a way that the value is under the Customs limit to avoid paying a refund to duties charged to U.S. customers.

The company’s shipments to U.S. customers grew from $9.7 million in 2010 to $20.4 million in 2016, according to the complaint.

The complaint includes details on dozens of shipments to Maine – to customers in towns such as Southwest Harbor, Seal Harbor, Cumberland Foreside and Kennebunkport – that were improperly split to avoid the duties. Also included are details on shipments to other states.

The investigation began after a complaint by a former Pure Collection employee in Britain, Andrew Patrick, who tried unsuccessfully to interest Customs officials in London in the company’s practices in 2014.

He ultimately filed suit in Maine in 2016 through a Portland law firm and the federal government then intervened in the case. Patrick will receive a reward of 18 percent of the settlement amount, or more than $160,000 under a whistleblower provision of the False Claims Act.

Chad W. Salvas, 39, of Rockland was arrested last May and charged with two counts of felony theft and two counts of felony forgery. At the time, the owner of J&J Lobster told police he suspected that Salvas, his dock manager, had stolen the money, according to an affidavit filed in court by the Rockland Police Department.

The affidavit says company owner Jamie Steeves told city police and the Maine Marine Patrol in April 2017 that a seafood wholesaler who was supposed to have already been paid about $230,000 for bait had not received the money. The formal charges filed in May, however, only state that Salvas is suspected of stealing several thousand dollars.

Police interviewed Salvas in April. He denied wrongdoing, according to the affidavit. He was arrested and charged the following month.

Salvas did not appear for his arraignment in August and was arrested again and charged with failure to appear. His bail of $250 cash was forfeited.

Salvas subsequently was released after paying bail of $500 cash.

His attorney, Laura Shaw, filed a motion in November to suppress the statements he made to police, claiming he was not advised of his Miranda rights and that police engaged in impermissibly coercive interrogation techniques. A hearing on that motion has not yet been held.

In last week’s Rockland Police Department summary to the City Council, the department said it “continued working with the Maine Marine Patrol on a large-scale fraud/theft investigation.” Police confirmed Monday that case involved Salvas.

No additional charges have been filed since the May arrest.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/large-scale-fraud-under-investigation-at-rockland-lobster-company/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/06/20140627_lobsterman10.jpgMon, 12 Feb 2018 19:13:21 +0000Man charged with causing standoff in Rockland had just gotten out of jailhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/man-charged-with-causing-weekend-police-standoff-had-just-got-out-of-jail/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/man-charged-with-causing-weekend-police-standoff-had-just-got-out-of-jail/#respondMon, 12 Feb 2018 21:02:52 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/man-charged-with-causing-weekend-police-standoff-had-just-got-out-of-jail/ROCKLAND — A 62-year-old Bangor man who police say created a nearly five-hour standoff at a downtown hotel had stopped in Rockland on his way home from a jail stay.

Timothy N. St. Thomas was arrested shortly before 1 p.m. Sunday at the Trade Winds Inn and charged with criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon, two counts of disorderly conduct and criminal trespass.

He was taken to the Knox County Jail in Rockland. On Monday afternoon, District Court Deputy Chief Judge Susan Sparaco set bail at $5,000 cash during a hearing at Knox County Unified Court in Rockland.

Assistant District Attorney Christopher Fernald said St. Thomas has a lengthy criminal record dating back to 1981, including convictions for numerous criminal trespass, assault and threatening offenses. Fernald said St. Thomas had completed a jail sentence Thursday at Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset and was heading to Bangor when he stopped for a stay at the Trade Winds.

According to a court affidavit filed by police, Rockland officers were called to the hotel before 8 a.m. Sunday by the hotel staff, who asked for St. Thomas to be removed.

St. Thomas was screaming in his room when officers arrived. They asked him to come out but he refused and began barricading the door with items inside the room, according to the affidavit.

Officers got a room key, pushed the door open and were met with St. Thomas threatening to kill them and swinging a 4-to-5-foot-long stick at their heads.

Police retreated and the standoff began. There were no injuries.

Officers were initially called to the hotel at 4:30 a.m. when St. Thomas was being disorderly, according to police, but they managed to calm him down.

The chief said Sunday since officers did not know if he had any other weapons in the room, they decided to hold off trying to immediately enter the room.

The section of the hotel on the fourth floor was cleared, but otherwise guests remained in their rooms. People were coming out of the hotel throughout the standoff, getting in their vehicles and leaving.

A Maine State Police tactical team tried to talk with St. Thomas, but except for once when he came out onto the balcony of his room, he did not communicate with them. On the balcony, he was ranting about a variety of things and saying he was a veteran and wanted more respect. He also said that all he wanted earlier in the morning was food and the dining area was not open, so he got the food himself.

Local attorney William Pagnano, who is also a justice of the peace, signed a search warrant and arrest warrant for police before they entered the room to apprehend St. Thomas.

The Trade Winds is on Park Drive across from the Rockland police station. Harbor Park was closed off as police vehicles staged in back of the station and out of view of the hotel room where St. Thomas was. Park Drive from Main to Winter street was also closed shortly before state police went inside the room.

At Monday’s hearing, defense attorney for the day Daniel Purdy said that St. Thomas had been in court two weeks earlier and another judge said he was not mentally fit to be in court.

St. Thomas asked to have an attorney appointed for him.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/man-charged-with-causing-weekend-police-standoff-had-just-got-out-of-jail/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/1330882_3214-t1200-20180212_141336.jpgTimothy St. Thomas, standing, made his initial appearance Monday in Knox County Unified Court.Mon, 12 Feb 2018 19:49:26 +0000Former BIW union official gets 18 months in prison for embezzlinghttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/former-biw-union-official-gets-18-months-for-embezzling-280000/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/former-biw-union-official-gets-18-months-for-embezzling-280000/#respondMon, 12 Feb 2018 16:48:30 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/12/former-biw-union-official-gets-18-months-for-embezzling-280000/The former secretary-treasurer of Bath Iron Works’ largest labor union was sentenced Monday to 18 months in prison for embezzling more than a quarter-million dollars from the union, largely to support his and his wife’s drug addiction.

Ryan Jones, 35, of Bath was sentenced in U.S. District Court in Portland by Judge George Z. Singal for embezzling $280,865 from Local S6 of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. The judge also ordered Jones to serve three years of supervised release after his prison term ends, and to pay $280,865 in restitution.

Jones pleaded guilty on Sept. 6, 2017, to a single count of embezzlement of union funds.

Jones served as secretary-treasurer of Local S6 from 2009 until January 2017. U.S. Attorney Halsey B. Frank said in a statement Monday that court records indicate Jones stole the funds between May 2012 and November 2016. His tenure as a leading union official ended after he failed to win re-election. Newly elected union officials discovered significant discrepancies with union finances and confronted him.

Frank said the discrepancies led to an investigation that revealed Jones made almost 200 unauthorized withdrawals from the union’s bank account, that he fabricated monthly bank statements to conceal his withdrawals, and that he provided fabricated bank statements to deceive union auditors.

The investigation was conducted by the Bath Police Department, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

In a sentencing memo filed last week in U.S. District Court, Jones’ attorney, Richard S. Berne of Portland, asked the judge to consider a lower sentence of one year followed by a substantial term of supervised release that would allow Jones to continue his addiction recovery.

“We sincerely hope Your Honor will consider our recommended sentence for this very flawed, but very good man, who made a terrible mistake,” Berne wrote.

In a telephone interview Monday night, Berne said Singal “carefully considered all the factors and circumstances” surrounding his client’s case, and though the sentence the judge imposed was longer than requested, “it was a very thoughtful and appropriate resolution.”

Berne said in court documents that his client attended local schools in the midcoast before going to work for Bath Iron Works at the age of 19.

In his leadership role in Local S6, Jones was active politically at the State House and on Capitol Hill, where he attended meetings to advocate for congressional funding for new ships to be built at BIW.

In 2012, Jones decided to tap into union funds “to maintain a lifestyle created” by his and his wife’s “interdependence on partying, drugs, and alcohol,” and the embezzlement continued through 2016, Berne told the court in his sentencing memo. “How much of Ryan’s participation was fueled by the terrible things he was doing at work to mask his crime is impossible to determine, but his eventual spiral from alcohol and marijuana abuse to alcohol and cocaine addiction in 2015 sealed his fate.”

Berne said his client has been “clean and sober” for nine months.

In the sentencing memo, Berne also said that Jones is in the midst of recovery, not only from addiction to drugs, “but also from the chaos of his uncharacteristic conduct. As the court is aware, Ryan’s strengths lie in his connection to the people in his life – his family and co-workers most importantly. He has lost much through this prosecution, but ironically, it may have saved his life.”

Timothy N. St. Thomas was arrested shortly before 1 p.m. at the Trade Winds Inn and charged with criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon, two counts of disorderly conduct, and criminal trespass, according to Rockland Police Chief Bruce Boucher.

There were no injuries.

More charges – including creating a police standoff – could be filed against St. Thomas.

St. Thomas was to be taken to Pen Bay Medical Center in Rockport by police before being transferred to the Knox County Jail in Rockland.

The standoff began about 8 a.m. Sunday when officers were called by hotel staff to have St. Thomas removed from the hotel. Officers had been called there at 4:30 a.m. when he was being disorderly, according to police, but they managed to calm him down.

When officers arrived the second time, he came at them with a club, police said. The man then locked himself in a room.

The chief said that because officers did not know if he had any other weapons, they decided to hold off trying to immediately enter the room.

The section of the hotel where St. Thomas was located on the fourth floor was cleared, but otherwise guests remained in their rooms. People could also come out of the hotel throughout the standoff, get into their vehicles and leave.

Officers from the Maine State Police tactical team tried to talk with St. Thomas, but except for one time when he came out onto the balcony of his room, he did not communicate with them. During that time, he was ranting about a variety of things, saying he was a veteran and wanted more respect. He also said that all he wanted earlier in the morning was food and the dining area was not open, so he got the food himself.

William Pagnano, a local attorney who is also a justice of the peace, signed both a search warrant and an arrest warrant for police before they entered the room to arrest St. Thomas.

The Trade Winds is on Park Drive across from the Rockland police station. The hotel has 138 rooms and 15 suites.

Harbor Park was closed off as police vehicles staged in back of the station and out of view of the hotel room where St. Thomas was located. Park Drive from Main to Winter streets was also closed shortly before state police went inside the room.

St. Thomas is likely to make his initial appearance in Knox County Unified Court on Monday.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/11/police-in-standoff-with-man-at-rockland-motel/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/t1200-20180211_100801.jpgPolice are involved in a standoff with a man at the Trade Winds MotelSun, 11 Feb 2018 23:09:21 +0000Catholic school where convicted child abuser once taught moves onhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/11/catholic-school-where-convicted-child-abuser-once-taught-moves-on/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/11/catholic-school-where-convicted-child-abuser-once-taught-moves-on/#respondSun, 11 Feb 2018 09:00:00 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/?p=1330269More than 16 months after Henry Eichman was arrested for the sexual abuse of multiple children, the Brunswick parochial school where he taught is trying to put the episode behind it.

Eichman, who was sentenced Jan. 3 for abusing eight children in Sagadahoc County, was arrested in September 2016 and charged with abusing children at his home in Topsham, where he had started a theater group. He was subsequently charged with abusing one child at St. John’s Catholic School, where he worked as a drama teacher and helped with an after-school day care program.

Eichman was sentenced to 10 years in prison on 10 counts, including nine felonies. But the start last month of his prison term doesn’t signal the end of the impact his actions have had in two midcoast communities. At St. John’s, a new administration has pledged to enforce policies to protect children. And although no charges were ever filed because of contact Eichman had with children at his Midcoast Youth Theater in Topsham, the drama group points to its policy that no adult is ever alone with a child involved in a theater activity as a shield against abuse.

A similar policy existed at St. John’s, but details of how the abuse occurred were not spelled out in the court documents. The principal at the time of the abuse resigned in December 2016. The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, which oversees the Catholic school, would not comment on whether the departure had anything to do with the scandal. However, the pastor of the parish, which also plays a role in administration of the school, said the principal felt some held her responsible. She ultimately resigned a few months after Eichman’s arrest in September 2016, saying she was leaving to care for her mother in New Hampshire.

A new principal, Tim Forti, has insisted that the policy will be followed under his watch.

“I’ve made a promise to the families that this will not happen again,” said Forti, who started at St. John’s in July.

SOBERING EFFECT AT ST. JOHN’S

Eichman, 57, entered a plea Jan. 3 in which he didn’t admit guilt but conceded that rosecutors had enough evidence to get a conviction. Charges came about a month after the parent of one of the children he sexually abused reported him to police in Topsham. The cases, one in Sagadahoc County and one in Cumberland County, were eventually combined before being adjudicated in Sagadahoc County Superior Court.

Prosecutors said Eichman abused children that he met through family connections in his home. Some of those children became involved in his theater group. Investigators never questioned theater officials while they developed the case against Eichman – proof, the theater officials say, that Eichman hadn’t abused any of the children whom he came into contact with there.

“This wasn’t his playpen,” said Judith Meyer, who chaired the board of the youth theater.

At St. John’s, the revelations that a teacher had been convicted of sex abuse charges has had a sobering effect. Although a background check had been performed on Eichman prior to his hiring and during his employment, it came back clean, said diocese officials, because Eichman had never been accused of sexual abuse before his arrest.

Faculty and parents contacted by the Maine Sunday Telegram declined to comment. Victim impact statements filed in court have been redacted to remove any information that could identify the victims or their families.

SERIES OF LEADERSHIP CHANGES

But the Rev. Tom Murphy, pastor of the parish that includes the school, said Eichman’s arrest added to a period of upheaval for the school.

He said a majority of the parents of the students in the school are non-Catholics and view it as a private school, rather than a parochial school, and have competing desires for how much the school should invest in various facilities and programs. An advisory parent board had just been disbanded in 2016, Murphy said.

The school has since had two interim principals before Forti was chosen as a permanent replacement, Murphy said. It’s also working toward reinstating the advisory board, he said, with a focus on members who can help with fundraising and promotion of the school.

“I pulled the plug on it with a view to structure it better and reform it,” Murphy said of the advisory panel.

St. John’s is now trying to focus on the future, Murphy said, with the goal of increasing financial support and boosting enrollment. Fewer than 100 students currently attend the K-8 school, he said.

The school is also in the midst of a $4.7 million expansion, building an events center and gymnasium, which Murphy said has been sorely missed. Older students, in particular, often opt to move into public schools because they offer more athletic programs, he said.

With new facilities, a new principal and a new parent advisory board, Murphy said, he’s hopeful that St. John’s can get a fresh start now that Eichman is sentenced and in prison.

“We need to clear the air and get a clean slate,” he said.

Edward D. Murphy can be contacted at 791-6465 or at:

emurphy@pressherald.com

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/11/catholic-school-where-convicted-child-abuser-once-taught-moves-on/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/07/1226960_301958-Eichman-e1500258731722.jpgHenry A. Eichman, facing 16 counts of sexual abuse of children in Sagadahoc County, is scheduled to make his next court appearance on those charges July 27.Sat, 10 Feb 2018 20:48:08 +0000Maine man arrested in Massachusetts stabbinghttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/maine-man-arrested-in-massachusetts-stabbing/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/maine-man-arrested-in-massachusetts-stabbing/#respondSun, 11 Feb 2018 02:05:15 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/maine-man-arrested-in-massachusetts-stabbing/A Maine man has been arrested in connection with a stabbing in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, according to newspapers in Massachusetts.

Adam Martinez, 41, of York was arrested Friday night and charged with armed assault with attempt to murder, the Brockton Enterprise and Boston Globe reported. He was being held on $15,000 bail, the papers said.

They said a 40-year-old Bridgewater man had been stabbed in the back, neck and arms and police found a folding knife with a 4-inch-long blade inside the house where the stabbing occurred.

The victim was still hospitalized Saturday night, but his condition was unknown, the Globe reported.

Martinez was also treated at a hospital before being jailed, the paper said.

An officer reached Saturday night at the Bridgewater Police Department said he had no information on the incident.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/maine-man-arrested-in-massachusetts-stabbing/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/12/Crime-News-icon-5.jpegcrime scene tape police car genericSat, 10 Feb 2018 21:12:52 +0000Neighbors say Harpswell man, 83, accused of sexual abuse did not raise suspicionshttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/neighbors-say-harpswell-man-83-accused-of-sexual-abuse-did-not-raise-suspicions/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/neighbors-say-harpswell-man-83-accused-of-sexual-abuse-did-not-raise-suspicions/#respondSat, 10 Feb 2018 22:23:54 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/neighbors-say-harpswell-man-83-accused-of-sexual-abuse-did-not-raise-suspicions/HARPSWELL — Neighbors say an 83-year-old Harpswell man who has been charged with five counts of child sexual abuse was a hard worker who kept an eye out for neighbors and did not raise their suspicions.

Eugene Bergeron has been held on $100,000 bail since his arrest last month on the charges, some of which date back more than 20 years.

He and his wife, Glenda Bergeron, live in a trailer on Elton Farm Road. She declined to comment Saturday.

Bergeron was arrested at his home on Jan. 19 after a long investigation, said Lt. Donald Foss of the Cumberland County Sheriff’s office.

Two neighbors, Debbie and Rich Kelly, said they saw a sheriff deputy’s car at the Bergeron house before the holidays in December and then three cruisers in the middle of last month, presumably when Bergeron was arrested. They said they never saw deputies taking Bergeron out of the house. They also said they didn’t see him after the December visit by sheriff’s officials and later heard that Bergeron had been hospitalized.

Foss said investigators are keeping the case open because they believe that other victims may come forward.

Bergeron has been charged with two counts of gross sexual assault, a Class A felony, and three counts of unlawful sexual contact, a Class B felony. Those charges involve three different victims, all of whom were known to Bergeron, and the alleged abuse occurred between 1996 and 2007. One victim was under the age of 14, Foss said, while the other two were older than 14 but younger than 18.

Foss did not offer any details about the alleged abuse, but said the high bail set at Bergeron’s arraignment is a sign that the allegations are serious.

Another neighbor, Philip Nedza, said Bergeron was a Korean War veteran.

He also said the couple’s trailer was frequently visited by Glenda Bergeron’s family members.

“He had a small family and she had a large family,” Nedza said. “All I saw were a lot of different family members and boyfriends of family members going through. He didn’t seem to like that sort of thing, but he didn’t really say anything.”

Nedza said that, even though he was in his 80s, Bergeron worked hard, clamming, cutting grass in the neighborhood and plowing driveways in the winter. He also worked for car dealers, Nedza said, driving cars to auction sites.

“He was a worker,” Nedza said Saturday.

Bergeron also kept an eye on comings and goings in the small neighborhood, Nedza said. One time, Nedza allowed some friends to stay at his house, which abuts Card Cove, for fishing. When Bergeron spotted them, Nedza said, he made a point of asking them who they were and if they had permission to use Nedza’s house.

Nedza said he never saw anything suspicious about Bergeron’s behavior around children.

The Kellys also said they never saw anything going on that made them suspicious, but they agreed with Nedza that there was a lot of activity around Bergeron’s house, with relatives stopping in all the time.

Since Bergeron’s arrest, they said, the house has been quieter.

Glenda Bergeron apparently often baby-sat for her grandchildren, they said, but that seems to have ended since mid-January.

“All the kids and grandkids have disappeared,” Debbie Kelly said.

A criminal background check with the Maine State Bureau of Identification shows that Bergeron was charged with breaking and entering in 1957, when he would have been in his 20s, and was convicted of burglary in 1978.

The records show he was charged in 1995 with four counts of gross sexual assault and one count of unlawful sexual contact, but they don’t indicate that he was convicted of those charges. He is not a registered sex offender.

Foss said he was unaware of any prior abuse convictions.

Edward D. Murphy can be contacted at 791-6465 or at:

emurphy@pressherald.com

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/10/neighbors-say-harpswell-man-83-accused-of-sexual-abuse-did-not-raise-suspicions/feed/0Sat, 10 Feb 2018 18:24:35 +0000Harpswell man, 83, arrested on 5 counts of child sexual abusehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/harpswell-man-83-arrested-on-5-counts-of-child-sexual-abuse/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/harpswell-man-83-arrested-on-5-counts-of-child-sexual-abuse/#respondSat, 10 Feb 2018 04:02:48 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/harpswell-man-83-arrested-on-5-counts-of-child-sexual-abuse/An 83-year-old Harpswell man remains in the Cumberland County Jail on $100,000 bail after he was arrested last month on charges of child sexual abuse, some dating back more than 20 years.

Eugene Bergeron was arrested at his home on Jan. 19 following a lengthy investigation, Lt. Donald Foss of the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office said.

The investigation remains open, Foss said, because detectives believe there might be more victims who have yet to come forward.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more,” he said Friday.

So far, Bergeron has been charged with two counts of gross sexual assault, a Class A felony, and three counts of unlawful sexual contact, a Class B felony. Those charges involve three different victims, all of whom were known to Bergeron, and the alleged abuse occurred between 1996 and 2007. One victim was under the age of 14, Foss said. The others were older than 14 but younger than 18.

Foss did not offer any details about the alleged abuse, but said the high bail set at Bergeron’s arraignment is a sign that the allegations are serious.

A criminal background check with the Maine State Bureau of Identification shows that Bergeron was charged with breaking and entering in 1957, when he would have been in his 20s, and was convicted of burglary in 1978.

The records show he was charged in 1995 with four counts of gross sexual assault and one count of unlawful sexual contact, but they don’t indicate that he was convicted of those charges. He is not a registered sex offender.

Foss said he was unaware of any prior abuse convictions.

Anyone with information about Bergeron can contact the Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office at 774-1444.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/harpswell-man-83-arrested-on-5-counts-of-child-sexual-abuse/feed/0Fri, 09 Feb 2018 23:11:57 +0000Siblings sentenced to time served for their roles in Poland robberyhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/siblings-sentenced-to-time-served-for-their-roles-in-poland-robbery/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/siblings-sentenced-to-time-served-for-their-roles-in-poland-robbery/#respondSat, 10 Feb 2018 02:35:29 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/siblings-sentenced-to-time-served-for-their-roles-in-poland-robbery/AUBURN — A brother and sister involved in a Poland robbery in October were sentenced Friday to time served after pleading guilty to related crimes.

Michaela Wagg, 20, of Richmond and Caleb Wagg, 19, of Bowdoin worked out agreements with prosecutors to serve only the 85 days they had already spent at the Androscoggin County Jail. They were expected to be freed Friday.

Each defendant pleaded guilty in Androscoggin County Superior Court to aggravated criminal trespass, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison, and receiving stolen property, a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of six months in jail.

They will be subject to bail conditions for the next two years, during which they must not commit any new criminal conduct. If they comply, they’ll be allowed to withdraw their pleas to the felony. If they don’t comply, they can be sentenced to up to five years on the felonies.

They also must log 100 hours of community service and be in school or employed and provide proof to the District Attorney’s Office before returning to court in February 2020 to have their felonies dismissed. They have agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and testify truthfully if called upon to do so at the trials or hearings of co-defendants.

The two waived their rights to have their cases presented to a grand jury for indictment.

Neither had a criminal history before the robbery.

The siblings must not have any contact with each other until the cases of all five defendants have been resolved, Assistant District Attorney Claire Andrews said.

The two had been originally charged, as accessories, with robbery, a felony punishable by up to 30 years in prison, for their roles in robbing a man at gunpoint at his Poland home on Oct. 26. The man’s cellphone, marijuana, video console and games were stolen.

The Waggs and three others fled the scene in a getaway car driven by Michaela Wagg, Andrews told Active-Retired Justice Robert Clifford.

At one point during the robbery, one of the group threatened to shoot the victim’s dog and hit the victim on the head with a revolver, breaking his eyeglasses, Andrews said.

They had accused the victim of having slashed their tires. As the victim tried to show them on his cellphone that he hadn’t, they took his phone.

To Michaela Wagg, Clifford said: “You’re a good student and you have an opportunity to get over this and get back to the academic world. You’re fortunate to have the scholastic ability to get good grades.”

He urged her to get her life back together. “I certainly hope you do so and wish you the best in doing that.”

Michael Barrucci, 24, is being held at the Androscoggin County Jail in Auburn in lieu of $200,000 cash or $400,000 in real estate.

Judge Charles Dow ruled in 8th District Court against Barrucci’s motion to be freed on supervised release or home confinement with an electronic monitoring device.

Defense attorney Adam Sherman said his client walked into Major Cuts barbershop on Cedar Street on Dec. 6 shortly before it closed because he needed a haircut and the next closest shop that cut African-American hair was in Portland. He said Barrucci hadn’t known his girlfriend’s estranged husband was in the shop at the time and that it was a “chance” meeting.

Assistant District Attorney Katherine Bozeman disputed that account, telling Dow that Nicole Robinson had communicated by phone with stabbing victim Rashad Robinson, 35, and had known where he was at that time.

Robinson told police his estranged wife “set me up.”

Sherman told the judge that Barrucci acted in self-defense when Rashad Robinson confronted him at the shop, assaulted Nicole Robinson and threw her over a couch. Sherman said Rashad Robinson threatened Barrucci, then struck him in the forehead.

“We believe this is a very viable self-defense case,” Sherman said, pointing to Nicole Robinson and her friend as witnesses who would corroborate that version of events.

Sherman asked that Barrucci and his girlfriend be able to have contact.

Bozeman argued that independent witnesses at the shop, including barbers, told police a different account that is “completely inconsistent” with Sherman’s version.

None of the witnesses heard Rashad Robinson threaten to “cut” Barrucci, she said. Yet, they heard Barrucci say that he had tried to kill Robinson and that he hoped Robinson would die.

When police responded, they found Robinson lying on his back at the entrance to the barbershop, a large laceration in his chest and a large pool of blood near his abdomen, according to court papers.

Inside the shop, Barrucci, covered in blood, stood holding a brown folding knife. He was ordered to drop it, which he did, police said.

A hospital nurse detailed Robinson’s stab wounds to include two to his back, one across his chest, one in his stomach area and one under each armpit. Also during the fight, his spleen and diaphragm were damaged, according to police.

Barrucci was indicted Tuesday by an Androscoggin County grand jury on charges of attempted murder, elevated aggravated assault and two charges of aggravated assault.

An Oxford County man has been charged with making death threats against the recently appointed sheriff of Oxford County, state police say.

Police say they charged Joseph Salatka, 56, of Mexico, with one count of terrorizing after he called the state fire marshal’s office in Augusta and made threats against incoming Oxford County Sheriff James Theriault.

Theriault was appointed by Gov. Paul LePage last week to fill the position after Wayne Gallant resigned the office following a sexting scandal.

Fire marshals made Maine State Police aware of the call and Theriault was also notified. Troopers assisted in locating Salatka because his phone number registered on the fire marshal’s caller ID, state police said.

He was arrested on Roxbury Road in Rumford, a short distance from his home in Mexico. Salatka had an air pistol on him when he was taken into custody.

He is being held at the Oxford County Jail in South Paris.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/oxford-county-man-arrested-for-threatening-sheriffs-life/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/Joseph-Salatka.jpgFri, 09 Feb 2018 14:54:33 +0000Hiram man to serve 6 years for manslaughter in crash that killed Steep Falls womanhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/hiram-man-to-serve-six-years-for-manslaughter-in-fatal-windham-crash/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/hiram-man-to-serve-six-years-for-manslaughter-in-fatal-windham-crash/#respondFri, 09 Feb 2018 16:28:02 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/hiram-man-to-serve-six-years-for-manslaughter-in-fatal-windham-crash/A Hiram man will serve six years in prison and give up his driver’s license for life for a fatal 2016 crash in Windham.

Philip Macri will also serve four years of probation on a manslaughter charge in the December 2016 crash that killed Rebecca Perry, 38, of Steep Falls and seriously injured her then-15-year-old daughter.

In addition, Macri was sentenced to eight years, all of it suspended, for aggravated assault. That charge will result in an additional two years added to his probationary period. If Macri violates probation, he could be sent back to prison for a full 17-year sentence for manslaughter.

Prosecutors said Macri was going 75 mph in a 35 mph zone along Tandberg Trail when his pickup crossed the centerline and hit Perry’s pickup. Perry had swerved to avoid the crash, prosecutors said, and the collision actually happened in the breakdown lane on Perry’s side of the road.

A subsequent blood test found cocaine and marijuana in Macri’s system.

Justin Perry, Rebecca Perry’s husband, said no sentence could make up for the loss of his wife, but said he was satisfied with the terms agreed to in the plea bargain. He also said that he was satisfied that Cumberland County Superior Court Justice Nancy Mills agreed to impose the lifetime driving suspension “so no family has to go through” what his family has faced.

In addition to their daughter Gretchen, who suffered spinal injuries in the crash, Justin and Rebecca Perry have two sons.

Macri, who suffered only minor injuries in the crash, initially pleaded not guilty to the seven charges he faced in Cumberland County. He was re-arrested in April 2017 in Oxford Country after sheriff’s deputies checking on him while he was released on bond found him in Hiram with guns and cocaine. He was barred from possessing either while out on bail.

His trial had been expected to start next month, but his lawyers and prosecutors agreed on sentences in return for guilty pleas on the most serious charges he faced.

Macri declined to speak at Friday’s hearing, only answering “yes, your honor” or “no, you honor” as Mills worked through the terms of the agreement.

Mills agreed to impose the sentence the lawyers had agreed to, but said she saw no indication of remorse on Macri’s part.

Macri, flanked by his two lawyers, stared straight ahead when Justin and Gretchen Perry addressed Mills. He avoided eye contact with the Perrys, who glanced at him several times as each addressed the judge.

“The loss of her beautiful spirit will always be mourned,” Justin Perry said of his wife. Gretchen Perry said that, despite the pain of losing her mother, she resisted the urge to hate Macri.

“Then I would have turned into the monster you are,” she told him.

After the hearing, Justin Perry said his daughter has largely recovered from her injuries, is a high school honors student and hopes to get medical clearance to resume playing softball this spring.

Macri was also sentenced Friday on charges from his April 2017 arrest in Oxford County that were transferred to Cumberland County. Two four-year sentences for violating his conditions of bail and aggravated drug trafficking will run concurrent with his six-year sentence for manslaughter.

Edward D. Murphy can be contacted at 791-6465 or at:

emurphy@pressherald.com

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/09/hiram-man-to-serve-six-years-for-manslaughter-in-fatal-windham-crash/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2017/04/1178535_216947-20170407_Macri_2.jpgPhilip Macri, with attorney Gerard Conley, is arraigned Friday on manslaughter and other charges in the Windham crash that killed a Steep Falls woman.Sat, 10 Feb 2018 00:08:29 +0000Transitional home for young offenders planned for Portlandhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/transitional-home-for-young-offenders-planned-for-portland/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/transitional-home-for-young-offenders-planned-for-portland/#respondThu, 08 Feb 2018 23:26:38 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/transitional-home-for-young-offenders-planned-for-portland/The state is planning to open a transitional home for young offenders in Portland, nearly one year after Westbrook blocked the same project from opening in a residential neighborhood.

The South Portland-based nonprofit Opportunity Alliance has contracted with the Maine Department of Corrections to run the program at a house in Portland’s Riverton neighborhood. Called Project Rise, it would house up to six men 18 to 21 years old who are leaving Long Creek Youth Development Center in South Portland. The goal is to reduce the chances that residents would re-offend.

“Absent a program like this, youth who have served their time will be released, and for many of these individuals, they can’t go home,” said Michael Tarpinian, president and CEO of Opportunity Alliance. “So they could be left on the streets or they could be left to an unsupervised transition. We believe that their success rate is much, much greater with this type of transition.”

Project Rise could open as soon as March 1. The Zoning Board of Appeals approved the project in September and Portland issued a building permit for renovations in December. The nonprofit only needs two fire permits and a final inspection to earn a certificate of occupancy.

Opportunity Alliance originally planned to open the home in Westbrook and purchased a single-family home there in 2016. But neighbors objected to sharing their neighborhood with young men coming out of the corrections system, and the city rewrote its zoning ordinances related to transitional homes. When the building then failed an inspection for an occupancy permit in April, Project Rise was barred from opening there.

Tarpinian said the nonprofit decided to sell that house and lease another at 1519 Forest Ave. in Portland. Tarpinian said he also has heard concerns from neighbors in Portland, but he has been working to reassure them. Opportunity Alliance has experience working with youth offenders, he said, and this program will be under 24-hour supervision.

“I don’t want to diminish those concerns, but what we’ve told them is that we will be there,” Tarpinian said. “We will provide supervision. We will be a communicator with them. I think time will ease their fears.”

Long Creek itself is in a time of transition.

A transgender boy committed suicide at the detention center in 2016 – the first suicide there in decades. The following March, three residents ran away during an outing and crashed a stolen car. The superintendent resigned. An independent audit conducted last fall concluded Long Creek lacked leadership, was understaffed and not equipped to handle the mental health needs of many of its residents.

Caroline Raymond, the new superintendent, has vowed to make improvements. But some groups, like the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine, believe Long Creek should be replaced by an entirely community-based model for juvenile justice. Last month, experts from the University of Southern Maine and the University of Maine School of Law published a 26-page paper that made a similar recommendation. Other states, like Missouri, have phased out their youth detention centers.

The detention center in South Portland was built to house 160 residents. But as research shows negative consequences from incarcerating kids, the youth prison population in Maine has dropped dramatically. As of Thursday, there were 49 full-time residents – 42 boys and 7 girls.

Colin O’Neill, associate commissioner at the Department of Corrections, said more than half are between 18 and 21 years old. They no longer have legal guardians outside of Long Creek who can help them oversee their reintegration into the community.

“A lot of these residents, once they successfully complete their program at Long Creek, they no longer need to be in secure confinement,” O’Neill said. “A lot of these residents also don’t have a safe and adequate place to go.”

There is no reliable measure of a national recidivism rate for young offenders because each state operates its juvenile system differently.

In Maine, a study published in 2016 found more than a third of committed youths re-offended within a year of their release. Within two years, more than half re-offended.

O’Neill said the young men who are eligible for Project Rise would likely already be allowed to leave Long Creek during the day for work. Juvenile offenders convicted of more violent crimes or in need of significant mental health services would not be accepted.

Once at Project Rise, residents would be required to pursue further education or work, learn life skills and seek future housing. They would live at the house on Forest Avenue for about six months. “It will help to continue to provide them with the necessary skills to not only stay out of the criminal justice system, but also to thrive,” O’Neill said.

Megan Doyle can be contacted at 791-6327 or at:

mdoyle@pressherald.com

Twitter: megan_e_doyle

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/transitional-home-for-young-offenders-planned-for-portland/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/shutterstock_112286042.jpgjuvenile offenderFri, 09 Feb 2018 10:48:05 +0000Skowhegan man headed back to prison on child pornography chargehttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/skowhegan-man-headed-back-to-prison-on-child-pornography-charge/
Thu, 08 Feb 2018 20:33:35 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/skowhegan-man-headed-back-to-prison-on-child-pornography-charge/SKOWHEGAN — A Skowhegan man who served federal prison time more than a decade ago for distributing child pornography was back in court this week, accused of possessing more than 50,000 images and videos depicting children engaging in sexually explicit conduct with adults.

Phillip Carlo, 33, of Water Street, Skowhegan, agreed to a guilty plea with county prosecutors that will send him back to prison for five years, according to court documents. The sentence to be imposed April 3 calls for a 10-year prison sentence, with all but five years suspended, and three years’ probation.

Carlo was arrested in June on six class B felony counts of possession of child pornography. The plea agreement is for two counts of possession of sexually explicit materials depicting a minor.

Skowhegan police, along with agents from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and an investigator from the Somerset County District Attorney’s Office, executed a search warrant at 166 Water St. in Skowhegan and arrested Carlo on charges of illegal possession of sexually explicit material.

Police acted on a tip that Carlo was viewing illegal material on multiple devices.

The information was received from a person who saw Carlo looking at what the person believed was child pornography on his computer, then-interim police Chief Joel Cummings said in June. Because of the scope of the current case and the history of Carlo’s previous conduct, the federal authorities were brought in.

Carlo was convicted of distributing child pornography on Aug. 18, 2005, in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Virginia. He served about 33 months on those charges, Cummings said.

In the Skowhegan case, a desktop computer and six thumb drives were analyzed by federal agents and found to contain 20,000 still images and about 500 videos of child pornography, many of them involving boys under the age of 10 engaging in sexual activities with adult men, according to court records.

Carlo allegedly told police he had been viewing child pornography since he was 13 years old and had been collecting child porn for the past seven years.

Carlo is represented by Skowhegan attorney John Martin. He could not be reached Thursday for comment on the case.

]]>https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/802606_498288-Carlo.jpgPhillip CarloThu, 08 Feb 2018 15:47:31 +0000Leaders of East Coast credit card fraud ring sentenced to prisonhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/leaders-of-east-coast-credit-card-fraud-ring-sentenced-to-prison/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/leaders-of-east-coast-credit-card-fraud-ring-sentenced-to-prison/#respondThu, 08 Feb 2018 19:09:10 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/leaders-of-east-coast-credit-card-fraud-ring-sentenced-to-prison/NEW HAVEN, Conn. – The ringleaders of a credit card fraud scheme that made almost $180,000 in fraudulent purchases at stores in multiple states have been sentenced to prison.

The U.S. attorney for Connecticut says the group’s leader, 31-year-old Mei Bao Lu, was sentenced Wednesday to 18 months behind bars. His second-in-command, 31-year-old Yang-Shi Lin was sentenced to a year in prison. Both men are from New York City.

Prosecutors say they distributed 120 counterfeit credit cards made with stolen information to other members of their group, which were used to make fraudulent purchases in Connecticut, Florida, Maine, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

The investigation started in Connecticut in February 2015 when several people who had dined at the same restaurant told police their cards had been used for unauthorized purchases.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/08/leaders-of-east-coast-credit-card-fraud-ring-sentenced-to-prison/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2015/02/588310_Visa-Travel-Tracker.JPEG-08.jpgfour line plez - In this Feb. 25, 2008 file photo, a cardholder poses with his Visa credit card, in Springfield, Ill. In an effort to combat credit card fraud, the payment processor Visa on Thursday, Feb. 12, 2015 said it will be rolling out a product next month that will track credit card users on their smart phones. (AP Photo/Seth Perlman, File)Thu, 08 Feb 2018 14:32:05 +0000LePage appoints former Mexico police chief as Oxford County sheriffhttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/lepage-appoints-former-mexico-police-chief-as-oxford-county-sheriff/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/lepage-appoints-former-mexico-police-chief-as-oxford-county-sheriff/#respondWed, 07 Feb 2018 23:39:57 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/lepage-appoints-former-mexico-police-chief-as-oxford-county-sheriff/RUMFORD — Gov. Paul LePage has appointed former Mexico police chief James Theriault of Rumford to serve the remainder of Wayne Gallant’s term as Oxford County sheriff.

Theriault, a Rumford resident, retired in early 2014 after 20 years as Mexico’s police chief.

James Theriault of Rumford has been appointed Oxford County sheriff. Sun Journal photo

“I know there’s a lot of work to be done,” Theriault said Wednesday. “I’m anxious to get in there and get started on it. And I hope the citizens of Oxford County will be patient with us. I hope to bring the good name of the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office back.”

He said he could be sworn in as soon as Friday in South Paris.

Don Berry, chairman of the Oxford County Democrats, said the governor’s office notified him on Tuesday that Theriault had been appointed to fill out Gallant’s term.

Berry said Theriault was one of three candidates named by Oxford County Democrats for consideration for sheriff. The other nominees were Chief Deputy Hart Daley, currently the acting sheriff, and Lt. Mike Ward, currently serving on the Oxford Police Department.

The nominees had to come from the Democratic Party because Gallant won the sheriff’s seat as a Democrat.

Theriault said he’s preparing to run for a full term after Gallant’s term ends Dec. 31.

“I’ve already got my papers and I’m starting to get signatures,” Theriault said. “So yes, I am running. I figured if I run and win one term, which is four years, that’ll make me 74 years old, and that’s about enough.”

Asked about rumors that he had already fired Acting Sheriff Hart Daley, Theriault said he has not fired anyone.

“Hart is resigning,” Theriault said, “but I did not fire him. I have the legal right to choose whoever I want as a chief deputy and I’m choosing somebody else other than Hart.”

Elaborating further, he said Daley is “eligible to retire anyway. His resigning date is effective on the 20th (of February).”

Theriault said he and his wife, Mary, went to Augusta on Monday to meet with LePage and his lead counsel. Theriault was notified of his appointment at about 3 p.m. Tuesday.

He noted that his wife is “ecstatic” about him becoming sheriff. “She was supportive and very happy. And all my kids are.”

Theriault was elected in June 2017 to a three-year term on the Rumford Board of Selectmen. He indicated he will decide over the next couple of months whether to resign.

“I’m going to have my hands full (at the Sheriff’s Office) in South Paris,” he said.

Press Herald Staff Writer Dennis Hoey has contributed to this report.

]]>https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/lepage-appoints-former-mexico-police-chief-as-oxford-county-sheriff/feed/0https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/4/2018/02/Theriault2-e1518090459276.jpgThu, 08 Feb 2018 06:47:49 +0000Woman gets 8 days in jail for kicking officer in crotch, asks forgivenesshttps://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/jay-woman-pleads-guilty-to-kicking-officer-in-the-groin/
https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/jay-woman-pleads-guilty-to-kicking-officer-in-the-groin/#respondWed, 07 Feb 2018 23:18:51 +0000https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/07/jay-woman-pleads-guilty-to-kicking-officer-in-the-groin/FARMINGTON — A Jay woman pleaded guilty Tuesday to kicking Jay police officer Dylan Rider in the groin last year when he tried to get her into a cruiser.

Carol Welch, 48, was sentenced to eight days in jail with credit given for four already served. She will report to jail Feb. 20.

Carol Welch Franklin County Detention Center photo

Welch entered guilty pleas in Franklin County Superior Court to felony assault on an officer and misdemeanor charges of refusing to submit to arrest or detention-physical force and criminal mischief.

“I am extremely sorry,” she said. “I am an alcoholic. I hope the officer can forgive me for what has happened.”

Rider did not attend the court proceeding.

Deputy District Attorney James Andrews said Rider would have testified that on Oct. 6, 2017, he responded to a domestic dispute complaint and found Welch heavily intoxicated. She complained of back pain and was taken to Franklin Memorial Hospital in Farmington and cleared for release.

Rider would testify that Welch had to be physically removed from the hospital, kicked hospital doors and knocked them off the track and kicked him in the groin after he handcuffed her and tried to get her into a cruiser, Andrews said.

At Tuesday’s sentencing, Judge Rick Lawrence accepted a two-year agreement on the assault charge with conditions that she not use alcohol, continue alcohol abuse counseling and adhere to a pretrial supervision agreement. If she does, she will be allowed to withdraw her plea to the felony charge and it will be dismissed. If she doesn’t, she faces up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Andrews reviewed Welch’s criminal record, which included convictions for criminal mischief, unauthorized use and operating under the influence, and asked that she be sentenced to 14 days on the misdemeanor charges.

Defense attorney Jeffrey Wilson argued for four days in jail, saying Welch had already been punished by losing her job and being publicly humiliated. She has also checked in with a pretrial supervisor every night, is undergoing counseling and attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, he said.